Fire Rainbow
by Sileny
Summary: Niou is an assassin for Rikkai, in a world where there is no such thing as safety, where comfort is scorned upon, where warmth is only temporary, and where love is nonexistent. Only the legends are constant and reliable. Platinum Pair
1. Prologue

**Fire Rainbow  
**By: Sileny

_**Summary: **_Niou is an assassin for Rikkai, in a world where there is no such thing as safety, where comfort is scorned upon, where warmth is only temporary, and where love is nonexistent. [Platinum Pair]  
_**Disclaimer: **_I do not own Prince of Tennis, and am not making a profit from this in any way, shape, or form. Furthermore, I do not own Niou. *sighs*

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**_Fire Rainbow:_** an opical phenomenon that is, in reality, not a rainbow, but an ice-halo formed by ice crystals in high level cirrus clouds. It is an illusion of sorts, a rare one, but an illusion no less.

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_**Prologue**_

The village was bathed in the soft, golden light of sunset. The men who worked in the fields besides the village were returning to their homes, hot, sweaty, and weary after yet another day of backbreaking work. Spring had come late that year, and there had been a delay in the planting, inevitable, of course, for none could fight against the weather. But the summer had been colder than most, and the crops were not growing as strongly as they had in years past, nor were the earlier pickings as abundant as they used to be.

The traders, too, seemed to mirror the ailing fields. They came rarely to the village, and the goods that they traded they demanded a much higher price for. But what was needed was still needed, and so the villagers clenched their teeth, tightened their belts, and paid their gold and silver and copper to the traders for the items that they needed.

Night and the darkness that came with it had not even fully taken over the village when everyone was out of the streets. Windows were locked and shuttered, doors were barred and any cracks were sealed by pushing a thick cloth, rolled tightly, against it to prevent any light from the candles that burned inside homes to leak outside. For when night fell, _he_ roamed, and anyone who crossed his path was never spared to tell the rest of the villagers of his nightly encounter with him. In fact, all that remained to herald of such an encounter was their bodies, lying still with an expression of absolute morbid horror on their faces.

So it was rather unfortunate, then, that a young traveler had happened upon the village after nightfall. His horse plodded wearily down the worn, dusty trail, too tired to go at any pace that was faster than a steady, plodding walk, and the young man knew that it would be a waste of his efforts to try and make the animal go faster. A cold wind blue over the road, and the man shivered, drawing his traveler's cloak more tightly around his thin frame.

He was looking forward to getting to the nearest tavern, to lodging his tired horse so that the poor beast could get a decent night's rest in a proper stable, and most of all, he was looking forward to the warmth that a tavern offered. He could just imagine the heat of a brightly burning hearth fire, could taste his first hot meal in days on his tongue, could feel the cool refreshing feel of ale as it slipped down his throat, and could feel the softness of a real bed underneath him.

"Stepping into this village after nightfall is a dangerous thing to do, sir."

The traveler straightened up, staring warily around him. His horse shifted uneasily from side to side, ears laced back against its head. "Who's there?" he called out into the darkness, narrowing his eyes suspiciously. When no answer came, he relaxed, gently nudging his horse forward again. It was nothing; simply a village boy playing a prank on a newcomer under the cover of night. That was all.

It was nothing to worry about.

His horse suddenly lifted its head in a violent jerking motion, and the traveler could see the white of the animal's eyes as the moon's light hit it. In the next instant, he was bucked off of the horse and sat up gingerly on the hard road, rubbing at his aching backside, cursing his bad luck as he listened to the quickly fading sounds of his horse's hoof beats.

"Horses are interesting creatures. They understand danger even without seeing it. You, sir, on the other hand, are a totally different matter."

Something grabbed the traveler roughly around the neck and he was hoisted effortlessly into the air, as if he weighed nothing. Struggling got him nowhere; the grip simply tightened and he was forced to stop all of his movements in order to concentrate all of his efforts to breathe.

"Why did you ignore my first warning? You should have turned tail and left for another town. If you had done so, your life would have still been yours when dawn breaks."

Fear clenched at the traveler's heart as he was set down. He turned to flee, but found himself in a labyrinth of hallways, stairs, and doors. He ran to one door, opened it, fled through it, and found himself back in the labyrinth. He repeated this procedure for another few times before coming to the cold realization that he could not escape. "Who are you?" he cried, whirling around, a rabbit pressed into a corner by an extremely hungry wolf. "What do you want with me? I can pay you gold… I'll do anything you want, just let me go!"

There was a dry, humorless chuckle. "Oh, keep your gold, sir. I'm not interested in it. Nor has it ever crossed my mind to let you go. You're amusing, and I suppose that I could call you a brave fool, but all fun must come to an end and with that, the instruments of such fun."

A cold sweat broke out over the man's body as dark mist poured out of the doorways, tumbling down the stairs and through the hallways towards him.

"Be grateful to have died by my Shadow Labyrinth."

He got a fleeting glance of a man wrapped in a red mage's robe with light brown hair, tousled and messy from the wind, before the mist stole over his body, wrapping itself cheerily around his limbs, and pinning him to the ground, strangling the life out of him.

That was the last thing the man ever saw. When dawn came, the rays of the climbing sun illuminated the traveler's broken body from where he lay on the road, his eyes wide with fright and his mouth open in an eternal scream. No trace of the labyrinth or the man that was the cause of his death remained.

The dead man's only sin was that he had ventured into the village after night had fallen.

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A/N: I got off my lazy butt and am now writing a Platinum Pair fic. It's probably a bad idea... I most likely won't be able to balance all of my fics. I hate you stupid plot bunnies who decide to hop in and make yourselves at home when I'm already drowning in work. *shakes fist*

But I should also blame my friend Helen... since if she never mentioned anything about fire rainbows the plot bunny wouldn't have decided to move in next to all my other plot bunnies (maybe I should charge rent for them all...).

Alternate Universe and pretty pretty magical powers! I love mages! :) Reviews are loved (as usual), and feel free to whack me on the head with a stick and tell me not to start so many multi-chapter stories and run them at the same time *coughTeresacough*

I really should learn how to write a successful oneshot... *sighs*

So... you know the drill. Click that little green button and review away! =(^_^)=


	2. Mountains

**_Chapter 1 – The Mountains_**

Rikkai was a rather large bit of land, with the stronghold of Seigaku to its north and the kingdom of Hyoutei to its east. To Rikkai's south lay the vast expanse of water known as the Earan Sea. To the west rose the strong peaks of the Adit Mountains, stretching for all their worth towards that blue, blue sky. Extending from the mountains and towards the lands occupied by Seigaku was the highlands, an endless terrain of steppe grass with the occasional village dotting the landscape and the more frequent nomadic herders. The marshlands and the jungles were located in an area roughly northeast from the sea, and there were sayings about a secret land, guarded by powerful magic, that had sister lands on Seigaku and Hyoutei soils.

In the heart of Rikkai the capitol was situated, resting in a lush valley that was rich with vegetation. The seat of power was held by a man named Yukimura, who although possessed not a significant amount of magical power, had a level head and impenetrable military and leadership skills to make up for it. His right hand man, Sanada, was the best swordsman in Rikkai and thus the resident swordsmaster. Yukimura's left hand man was one called Yanagi, a mage who studied diligently all forms of magic. It seemed, though, that his strongest point was that he could pick up what people wanted, if not in exact words, then in feelings, however, he was strong in defensive and offensive magic, as well as healing.

Niou was an assassin, the lowest rank in the in Rikkai hierarchy. However, he was the best of the assassins. As an assassin, he didn't rely as heavily on magic as Yanagi did, but he knew several spells in case the event called for them, his most favorite having to be Illusion. Niou was usually seen loitering around the grounds; Yukimura liked to save him for big-scale missions that he didn't want to be failed, and Niou did his best to fulfill them. He owed Yukimura quite a bit, he was unwilling to admit, but that was the truth, and so he always threw himself with unbridled passion into his job.

It was this reason that he was able to rise so fast and so effectively. He was never seen, never heard, and his Illusion saved him from being detected by magic users many a time. He'd leave the capitol suddenly for missions and then pop back up just as suddenly, looking tired from all his running around but successful. And sometimes he would come back with a few guests in tow, as he was also great at finding recruits for Rikkai, having a gift with people and seeing their potential only after observing them for a brief time.

On the grounds, though, when he wasn't in missions, Niou was quite popular with children, seeing as Niou was sitting in the middle of the courtyard, his back to the fountain, with the little pests clinging to him and squeaking happily as they tugged at his robes. "Niou-nii-san!" they squeaked, while Niou tried to make sure none of them got hurt. Yukimura was rather partial to children, and did not take well when one of those precious little things was injured. While Yukimura had no children of his own (he wasn't married, nor was he the type to have affairs with girls of age, although heavens knows how they wished he was) the courtyard would always be swarming with them. Orphans, most of them were, the results of border skirmishes or disagreements of the like in which their parents perished in, taken in under Yukimura's wing to be educated and raised, mostly found by Niou himself (perhaps that was why they were so attached to him).

One adventurous little boy had managed to perch himself on Niou's shoulders. How he got there, Niou had no idea, nor did any of the other children, thankfully. He wobbled a bit, and to steady himself as he slipped down, small hands reached up and grabbed at Niou's silvery-white hair. Niou tumbled sideways, yelping as his hair was tugged by little hands. If only it wasn't Yukimura who would be doling out the punishment if anything happened to his precious children… otherwise he'd frighten the children clear out of their skins so that he could have peace.

"Could you brats… get off…?" he grunted, resulting in whines, but thankfully the pests obeyed, and Niou was able to direct their attentions to someone else. Jackal happened to be closest, so Niou told the little ones to go bug the Master of Defenses and thus was able to escape from their little hands, snickering slightly to himself as he heard Jackal's cries of protest and mercy as he was assaulted by the army of little ones.

He nearly crashed into Marui as he left the courtyard, intent on returning to his chambers. "Yo," he offered with a slight tilt of his head.

"Hey," was Marui's reply, and then the Archery Master trotted along on his journey, picking up a few of Jackal's little charges on the way and telling them a story, complete with animated hand gestures. Enraptured, the children settled down for a moment, although their attentions soon directed themselves to something more entertaining, like Marui's flaming red hair. Niou watched for a moment, and then shrugged, spinning on his heel to continue to his rooms. As long as the children were appeased and not bothering him (and staying out of trouble, while they were at it, in order to ensure that Yukimura's wrath descended on no one, particularly him), he was happy.

A mop of curly black hair caught the assassin's attention. Kirihara Akaya dashed into view, lugging behind him a package which no doubt contained several old swords. As a direct apprentice to Sanada, the youngster was always in and around those weapons. And since he was still learning the basics and thus owned a practice sword, the items in the package were probably those that needed sharpening after having seen the abuse that the rest of Sanada's regular class dealt to them. Being the best swordsman in Rikkai was hard, Niou assumed. Sanada not only had to train soldiers in the art of the sword, but he also had to teach Kirihara on a one-on-one basis. And despite how fun the lad was to tease, dealing with him daily was not something that Niou thought he could handle without going mad. He applauded Sanada's skill and patience, although he had to wonder at how many slaps the poor boy had encountered when Sanada had a particularly rough day. Niou was thankful that he didn't have to teach a class in the arts of being an assassin. He wouldn't have had the patience for it, anyway and his students would have been a sorry mess by the time he was done with them.

Niou smirked as he padded along, one hand reaching out and plopping itself on Kirihara's messy black curls and giving it a rub. Dutifully, Kirihara greeted him and continued on his way. Niou's eyebrows rose in surprise; Sanada must have trained him viciously today after his regular class if Kirihara didn't have the energy to protest at Niou's greeting like he usually did. But no matter, the brat had a lot of responsibility on his thin shoulders. Niou had no doubt that he would be a fine swordsman.

"Niou-nii-san!" a small voice suddenly piped up at the foot of his robes. Niou pulled up short lest he trip over the speaker, a little boy of four years. Shining gray eyes stared up at his own blue ones as a small hand, curled into a fist in Niou's court robes, tugged downwards. "Niou-nii-san, tell the story about the mountains!" the child whined. "Please, please, please, please, please!" The child put on the sweetest face he could muster, which, granted, was quite sweet and angelic, and begged for his story.

"Not today, m'kay?" Niou asked, ruffling the child's hair with one hand. "How 'bout this… why don't you bug Marui over there, and he'll tell it to you. How does that sound?"

The child shook his head stubbornly. "Want Niou-nii-san to tell it," he retorted, attaching himself like a leech to Niou's leg. "Niou-nii-san tells it the best."

Niou forced down an exasperated sigh. What would he have to do in order slink off to his chambers and sleep? It was just a silly urban legend… anyone could tell since everyone who grew up in Rikkai was told the story of the Adit Mountains since birth. Niou himself could remember dimly his mother leaning over his cradle when he was tiny, singing softly in that rich highland dialect of his birthplace the legend to him. Different regions had different ways of telling the same legends, he had discovered later on in his life. The highlands sang it; the heartland spoke it with added dramatic effects like puppets and change of tone; the jungle people told it in pictures created from special powders thrown into fire, warped with a gentle stream of weak magic.

Niou himself preferred to tell it in the way that most people of Rikkai told it, normally with dramatic effects. He would have liked to use the highland dialect for his storytelling, but his singing voice was more than poor and could make glass shatter, although for everyone's comfort he never did it (perhaps he was embarrassed, too, about the lack of talent he had in his voice, although he never spoke of this). It was a pity, really. The highland dialect was quick and pure in his ears, bright but not too cheerful. But since that seemed to be a bit out of his league (even Niou knew what dreams to chase after and what dreams to leave alone), and so he contented himself with the thought that one day, he would learn to tell stories in the way it was told in the jungles.

Plus, who knew how many people he could prank with that method? He could just imagine it, now…

"Soya-kun, I'm afraid Niou won't be able to tell you the mountain story right this moment." Niou looked up from those pleading gray eyes to find Yukimura standing behind him, his ever-so serene smile upon his face and his robes shining in the late morning sun. There was a characteristic Yukimura air about the other man, kind and gentle yet at the same time stern and demanding. Yukimura made for a spectacular image.

He stepped forwards, the folds of his robe rustling against the stone floor, and gently removed little Soya from Niou. "Come, now, Soya-kun. I'm sure Marui and Jackal will be able to find some games for you to play." He nodded towards the other children who were clamoring and bouncing about the two. "Go play with the other children. Niou can tell you the story after supper."

The child seemed to consider this, weighing his options out in his mind, and then nodded. "Okay!" he squeaked out, giving Yukimura and Niou a wave and then trundling off to join the mob of children.

When he was safely out of earshot Niou devoted his full attention to his superior. "You normally don't come looking for me on your own," he said drily, leaning his back against one of the pillars. It didn't look like he would be sneaking off to get sleep in a while. "I'll be supposing you don't want small talk? When am I leaving, then?"

Yukimura chuckled, although his face became grim. "As expected of you, Niou. No wonder you were able to climb so high in your ranking. You know what I want from you even before I tell you." He studied Niou for a moment before shaking his head. "It's a waste for you to be an assassin. You really should have trained for something else… swordsman, perhaps, or maybe archery. You have impeccable aim."

"Why, thank you."

"Right, then, to business," Yukimura said briskly. "I've received word that there is a mage of considerable power wrecking chaos among the villages and cities that are along Rikkai's borders. Niou, you will be leaving tomorrow night in order to investigate this mage, scout him out and identify his abilities, as well as try to plot out what route he will most likely take so that he can be intercepted." What the people of Rikkai reported Yukimura took into serious consideration and then acted in a timely and appropriate manner to them, thus managing to appease the people and keep peace within Rikkai's own borders. Perhaps that was why he was such a popular leader, and there had been no uprisings against him.

Niou drank it all in quietly before he frowned. "Why tomorrow night? I can leave tonight." He highly doubted that Yukimura would make him stay an extra night just so that he could tell the child his promised story. While the other man liked it when the children were complacent he would never put that above work.

Yukimura had turned away from him and had started to walk off. When he heard Niou, though, he stopped and glanced over his shoulder at his subordinate. "Oh… that's because your guide won't be ready until tomorrow night," he said simply, and then left, leaving Niou to ponder.

***

A ball of light danced in front of Niou, carried by tiny wings of the palest yellow. Normally, Niou wouldn't have cared much, as his career carried him to many places around the world and he saw many strange and unusual things, but there was something about this little one that caught his attention immediately and effectively. Despite Niou's best efforts, he could not tear his blue eyes away from it.

It wasn't the armor that the small thing was covered in, although he was surprised to see that it had its own shiny defense wear of steel so polished that it shone bright enough to blind when hit with light. Nor was it the way that it bobbed in front of his eyes, seeming to be staring at him, but he couldn't tell because it had no visible eyes that Niou could immediately pick out.

No… it wasn't the physical properties of it that captured Niou's attention. Niou could easily have fit it in the palm of his hand, it was just a bit smaller than the average apple. It was something he had felt that had immediately given it his full and undivided attention.

"This is an Illusionary," Yanagi's voice sounded from somewhere behind his right shoulder, effectively bring Niou out of his musings and back to the present. Turning, the silver-haired man found Yukimura and Sanada present, as well. However, before Niou could ask what in the world's name was an Illusionary, Yanagi spoke again. "If a mage is threatened by a force that he does not think he'll make it through, then he can create an Illusionary," Yanagi explained, studying the little ball of light through his half-closed lids. "An Illusionary can only be created if the mage is powerful enough, as it is a fusion of part of the heart and part of the soul with the mage's own life energy. That's why they're so rare; there aren't a lot of mages powerful enough to create one and live."

He stopped talking then and held out his hand, and the thing (Illusionary, Niou corrected himself) plopped down into his palm. It sat there for a while before it launched itself back into the air and changed locations to Yanagi's shoulder. "The main purpose in an Illusionary's creation is to find someone who will reunite it with its master. When that's completed, the Illusionary fades away into nothing and anyone who's had contact with it will forget about its very existence. They'll think of it as an illusion, hence why we call it an Illusionary."

Niou was skeptical. "Why can't it find its master on its own?" he asked, frowning, not looking particularly satisfied with the explanation Yanagi had provided him. "It _is _made from its master's heart and soul, after all. I don't see why it needs someone else to help it find its master."

Yukimura smiled thinly. Next to him, Sanada looked grim. Niou's blue eyes passed over their faces, his brows furrowing as he watched them. "Niou, there are some things that would be best for you to wait and ask Hiro yourself," Yukimura said finally, a thoughtful look stealing across his gentle blue-violet eyes.

"Hiro?"

"We've questioned the Illusionary already," Sanada said curtly. "Yanagi found it lying outside his doorstep this morning and brought it in. All we were able to get out of it was that its name is Hiro, given to it by his master before its creation was completed."

Niou's frown deepened. "Can't you ask it for more? You're awfully persuasive when it comes to getting information, after all, Sanada," he said drily. Sanada's expression hardened, but Niou was saved a slap in the face by Yanagi, who took Hiro from his shoulder and deposited it on Niou's.

"The reason why I want you to leave tomorrow night instead of immediately tonight is so that you can spend the day bonding with your new guide," Yukimura said pleasantly, although he noticed the way Niou frowned at Hiro, who sat innocently on his broad shoulder. He heaved a sigh to himself; he could see a problem with this. Niou was fiercely proud of the way he was able to carry out missions quickly and efficiently, so his pride must have taken quite a blow when Yukimura requested he wait a day for his newest mission in order to 'bond' with a little ball of light that Niou could clasp in his hands.

And Yukimura was right… Niou resented the small thing for detaining him. Why couldn't they have done their bonding on the actual trip? He glared at it; Hiro promptly retaliated by sending a jolt of power through his body, causing him to do a movement that was between a jump and an extreme twitch.

"Do you understand, Niou?" Yukimura spoke again, and Niou left off glaring at Hiro to devote his attention to his superior. "On your mission, Hiro could very well save your life. He knows his master best, after all. It would be in your best interest to start to understand him; I'd hate to lose my best assassin." He broke off when Yanagi signaled to him with a brief wave of his hand. A brilliant smile spread across Yukimura's face. "Well, they have wonderful timing, as usual," he said cheerily. "Yanagi, remove the barriers around the courtyard and let the children in. It's time for their story, after all."

Niou groaned; he had forgotten the children and their insistence that Niou tell them a legend. Yanagi gave a wave of his hand and before Niou could even count to three the rascals were pouring into the courtyard, arranging themselves in a semi-circle in front of Niou, looking expectantly up at him. On his shoulder, Hiro bounced up and down, and Niou had the sudden urge to pick it up and squeeze him.

It was an urge he restrained, though, as he made himself comfortable on the ground in front of his audience. Yukimura, Sanada, and Yanagi followed suit, moving so that they could sit behind the children. Niou passed his blue gaze among the children, looking thoughtful. The mountains…

There really was no way out of this, Niou knew, but still he stalled, until he heard a light chuckling in his ear. The chuckling then broke off and replaced with a voice, distinctively male, deep and reassuring and yet hiding things that Niou did not understand. _'Niou-kun… was it…? Would you like me to help you tell the story? I myself have always liked the story of the mountains.'_

Niou scowled, but gave a slow nod of his head before redirecting his attention to the children. "Once… the world was a flat place. The ground extended for miles in every direction; there was nothing projecting from the ground and thus no shade, no objects to build from, no pools of water to satisfy the basic needs of life. The sun shone all day, scorching the ground until it cracked for lack of water."

Suddenly, Niou felt rather warm, sitting there in the courtyard at nightfall. It was like the sun was beating down relentlessly on his own head, and his limbs felt heavy, as if he had walked a long way in search of something. He frowned a moment, before pushing on, "There was a girl who lived during that time. Her name was Sakuno, and she worked for the nobles as a serving girl. Also at that time, Rikkai was plagued by demons, huge creatures that could easily trample a person to the ground with a single step. However, Sakuno knew one of these demons, and occasionally, she would go and speak to the demon, bringing it a small gift as she did.

"'We have no place to store water, for there is no dip in the ground for the water to collect in. We have no shade to protect us from the scorching sun, and whenever it rains, the dry ground sucks it up faster than we can drink it,' she would tell it as she offered it some of the limited food that the people had. The demon, feeling sorry for her and wanting to repay her kindness, gathered some of the demons about him and related the peoples' plight.

"The demons searched for three days and three nights before they found a place to their liking. There, at the secluded western side of Rikkai, they merged themselves with the earth and became the mountains, forever casting shade from the sun for all the people who moved to the mountain's base. They made grooves in the earth that merged with them so that water could flow and it would never be bone-dry. Trees grew, offering materials for building.

"That is why the mountains are called the Adit Mountains, meaning the 'beginning.' The formation of the mountains started life in Rikkai, for we would have all died without shade to shield us from undying heat, materials to build our dwellings with, and water to satisfy our needs."

Niou pushed himself up to his feet, and his audience followed suit. Yukimura stepped forward, smiling cheerfully and giving a clap of his hands. "That's all for tonight. Off to bed with all of you," he said, shooing the children away. They dispersed and trotted off to their dormitories, where their poor dormitory leaders would have to deal with their antics. His smile slipping off his face as soon as the last child vanished from view, he turned to Niou. "Have you picked up a new technique?" he asked. "All throughout the story, I felt like I was actually in it: the conditions, the feelings, everything."

Niou shrugged. "Don't know," he said, spreading his hands wide.

Yukimura looked troubled, but Yanagi nodded to Niou. "I'll look into this later. Get to bed, Niou, you'll be leaving tomorrow, and you need to be sharp." He gave Hiro a glance, raised an eyebrow, looking like he was asking it something, before turning away. "Niou, remember something. In this world, everything changes, everything is temporary. The only things that don't change and last forever are the stories and legends that we have to tell to others. When all else fails you, you must remember the legends. They are the only truth we have with us." With that, he swept out of the courtyard. Yukimura and Sanada bid Niou good night before following suit.

Hiro shifted himself to settle more comfortably on Niou's shoulder. If he had had a face, he would have had something akin to a smile on right at that moment. Niou… he would go far. Of that he knew.

* * *

_The people of this world… they get so caught up with the present that they forget the past. The past, no matter how exaggerated, should be held close, for they are our most reliable teachers. You can lose yourself; you can lose the reason for continuing on, but don't ever lose those legends._

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A/N: I feel Hiro is too cute for this kind of story, but I really don't want to elaborate on Illusionaries. Oh, well... *sighs*

Reviews are nice... you know... :)


	3. Travelling

**__**

Chapter 2 – Travelling

The next morning dawned bright and early, with the sun shining clearly and happily against a blue, blue sky. Niou sat up in his messy bed, his hair unkempt and sticking out at even odder angles than it did when he was awake and had tidied it. He stared in front of him for a few moments, blinking blue eyes as he brought his world into focus.

Niou's quarters were messy. Actually, that would have been a severe understatement. The floor was strewn with articles of clothing and other less easily identifiable items. Generally, it looked like he had angered Sanada and had then gotten the swordsmaster to crash through his room with his sword. Everything was in disarray, and his bed could barely be seen over a mountain of junk (Niou had started a collecting hobby a couple years ago).

Grumbling, Niou swung himself out of his nest of blankets that he had made for himself, shoved aside several miscellaneous items to give himself room, and then dove through the rest of his stuff to look for his court clothes, which he had peeled off of his body the night before and had simply thrown somewhere before falling asleep. Presently, though, he located the robes of blue silk and picked it up, unearthing a slumbering Hiro from their folds while he was at it.

"Oi, Hiro, wakey wakey," he said, catching the small thing into his hand before it could hit the floor and setting the Illusionary down on his bed. "We have bonding to do, and then packing. Or maybe packing and then bonding. Whichever suits the two of us." As he spoke, he had retackled the disorder of his room to find his traveling bag, a rugged leather bag that had been to plenty of places with Niou throughout his career.

The assassin knew that the Illusionary had woken up when Hiro landed on his shoulder, making itself comfortable. By then, Niou had figured out that Hiro's favorite place in all the world was on people's shoulders, although why it was so escaped him. There were plenty of other places that a thing the size of an apple could make itself comfortable in, and shoulders were generally boney and uncomfortable (at least, in Niou's opinion, they were). Hiro was certainly strange…

_'Your court robes are soft…'_

"Huh?" Niou gave Hiro a glance before digging through his accumulated junk some more, feeling rather like a dog digging for a bone that it had buried in the ground some time ago and wanted to chew on again.

_'Your court robes are soft and nice to sleep in.'_

Niou heaved a sigh and decided to ignore Hiro, deciding that he was still waking up. Even though he had only been with the Illusionary for a single evening, he had already nearly gotten used to that deep voice that it possessed, as well as the way Hiro 'spoke,' by having his words being projected in Niou's mind. It was rather unnerving at first, he would admit (he had thought he had gone mad the first time Hiro had tried to communicate with him and had nearly flung himself at Yanagi demanding a sleeping draught or something that could cure mental illnesses), but after a while, it became bearable and Niou figured that he had not gone mad.

Instead of answering Hiro, Niou busied himself with finding his traveling clothes, stuffing them into his bag before he hunted around for his weapons. It was probably dangerous to leave sharp objects lying scattered about his messy floor, but Niou was honestly too lazy to organize them all into neat categories like he knew Sanada had (but then again, the weapons of a swordsmaster and an assassin were vastly different), so on the floor they were. How Niou didn't manage to injure himself on them was a feat that was still being argued about, but he did it nonetheless, emerging unscathed from his quarters every morning.

Finding his blades and fitting them into their respective sheaths so that his poor travelling bag didn't get sliced to ribbons, he slid them into the bag. His fingers slid over the cold glass of a small vial, and he picked it up, rolling it idly between his fingers. Hiro fluttered off of his shoulder and moved to his wrist, bouncing a few times as if getting a better view of the vial.

"Poison," Niou informed Hiro as Hiro launched itself off of his wrist and circled the vial. "It's the strongest poison in the whole world, I believe, and I've heard that it's made from plants that are helpful to people, although I've never confirmed it." Making sure that the vial was securely capped, he slid in into a slightly larger container and tucked it away. "A single drop can kill a full-grown man in his prime in less then a minute, or so I've heard. Personally, I don't think that's true and all, but I don't have it in mind to test it out."

Niou heaved a sigh, holding out his hand, palm up, so that Hiro could land on it now that the vial was not up for further examination (the Illusionary did so rather happily). "Hopefully, I never will have to use it. I don't like poisons." His expression darkened, blue eyes flashing. Niou harbored more than just an extreme dislike for poisons. He despised them with everything that made up his existence, and with good reason, too. "Most poisons kill too slowly; it gets too painful to watch," he said softly, tilting his hand so that Hiro rolled off of it and into the air. "If they don't die, they get warped. They're not themselves anymore. I don't know which is worse…"

He fell silent, lost in his own thoughts, before he grumbled underneath his breath a few times. Finally, shaking his head from side to side furiously, he ran a hand through his messy hair, cursing when he raked through a knot. Reluctantly, he picked himself up from the floor and padded off to his desk, pawing through the amassed items on its surface before finding a wooden comb and forcing it through his hair, cursing all the while as he tugged and pulled and fought with the silver strands. There was, too, more than a couple small yelps of pain as some of the knots simply refused to be untangled, and after a few minutes Niou gave up entirely, throwing down his comb with a growl of frustration.

"I'll be bald like Jackal in no time if I have to comb my hair every day," the assassin complained to Hiro as it made itself a temporary nest on Niou's pillow while Niou stripped himself free of his light cotton tunic that he wore for sleeping so that he stood with his chest bare, shivering slightly in the early morning cold. One hand reached up and his fingertip traced a scar that started from just below his collarbone and that did a little curve like a crescent moon in the middle of his chest, right nest to his heart. Niou scowled at his reflection in the mirror as his finger trailed over the raised line of darkened and hardened skin.

"I am not pathetic," he hissed at his reflection. "I am strong." Hiro shifted slightly at Niou's venom-laced words (Niou's sharp eyes did not catch the reaction) while Niou himself settled with giving the mirror one final glare. Still scowling he grabbed his court robes and jammed them over his head, arranging them carefully over his body.

Niou quite liked his physical aspects, if he should say so himself. He possessed a lithe body and lightning-fast reflexes. He supposed that the reflexes he was supposed to have. If not, he would have been dead on numerous occasions. If only the scar wasn't present! If only every time he looked at his reflection in the mirror he didn't see that hated coil of black, raised flesh.

A light knock sounded and then his door slid open with a gentle whooshing noise. Niou looked up from tidying his robes in order to make him look neat to some degree to see Yanagi standing in his doorway. The mage stood there, calm and collected in his court robes of creamy white with darker trims, surveying the mess of Niou's room quietly, making no direct comment about it, although Niou knew that in his mind, Yanagi was wondering how on earth Niou was able to create such a mess (as evident from the slight raise of one of Yanagi's eyebrows).

"Did you need something?" Niou asked curtly, still rather irked from his episode with his reflection. His annoyance and his slight anger was reflected on his face. His eyes were dark and the scowl was making itself perfectly at home on Niou's lips.

Yanagi turned his head to Niou, and a small frown made its way across Yanagi's smooth and composed facial features. "You were thinking about _that_ again?" he asked. He did not elaborate as he had no need to; Niou knew very well what he was talking about, and the assassin's scowl darkened. Yanagi shook his head, letting out a soft sigh.

"Niou, it is in your best interest to forget about that," he said, firm but not entirely harsh. "Harboring such dark thoughts within you is bad for your soul."

"Yeah, yeah, whatever," Niou mumbled, giving a brief wave of his hand to show that he understood. He knew Yanagi was right; Yanagi was always right. But sometimes, it was hard to push away dark feelings like anger and the unrelenting want of revenge. "What did you want to see me for?"

Yanagi produced a scroll of parchment from within his wide sleeves and handed it to Niou, who took it and unrolled it. A map greeted his eyes, and Hiro settled itself on Niou's shoulder so that both were looking at it. "This is the route you will be taking," Yanagi said.

Niou's head tipped gently to one side. "It's kind of long, isn't it?" he asked, seeing how his chosen route passed along the borders of the lands of Seigaku and Hyoutei. The general area of his destination was circled, and Niou could find another way that would have led directly to it, cutting through central lands of Rikkai. "Why go longer when I could just cut across?"

"Don't be silly, Niou. You know that navigating the central lands is impossible," Yanagi rebuked him. "The central lands are protected with a stronger kind of magic than any of us possess; venturing into them if you are not meant to means certain death." Niou rolled up the scroll, nodding quietly. "Rumor has it that one of the Pillars is located in the central lands, which is probably why it is so well defended."

"The Pillar of Strength," Niou murmured softly, blue eyes glazing over for the briefest of instances before he focused back on Yanagi..

Yanagi grunted assent in the back of his throat as he slipped out of the room. "Indeed. No one has seen the Pillar of Strength or its sister pillars in Seigaku and Hyoutei with their own eyes in more than a hundred years, and since you an asset that Yukimura likes to fall back on more than one occasion, I highly doubt that he would appreciate you charging recklessly into danger that can be avoided." Yanagi glanced up towards the sky, judging the time while Niou snorted lightly. "We should hurry or else there will be no food left from breakfast. The little devils are amazing when it comes to food."

Here, Niou laughed, finding it amusing how Yanagi referred to the children as the 'little devils.' "Don't let Yukimura hear you call them that," he said, maneuvering himself out of his room, Hiro attached firmly to his shoulder. "He'd be more than just a little annoyed."

"I would suppose so," Yanagi said smoothly. "I can see why Yukimura sympathizes with them, though. They've had a rough life, having to watch events and know that they couldn't do anything to stop them." He glanced at Niou. "How similar they are to you, aren't they?"

Niou was silent, and for once, he couldn't think of anything to say against Yanagi's words.

***

Niou was quiet throughout breakfast, lost in thought. He sipped quietly at his tea and watched as Hiro sat on his plate, studying a slice of fresh-baked bread, still warm from the oven. How did Illusionaries eat, Niou wondered, if they had no mouths? Or if they didn't eat, how did they sustain themselves? Niou slid another cube of sugar into his teacup (by this time he had lost count of how much he had slipped into the amber liquid, having been at it since sitting down to eat), stirring it absentmindedly with a spoon.

Hiro glowed softly as he pushed himself off of the plate, bouncing on the slice a few times. Niou frowned slightly, setting down his teacup. "Hiro, don't bounce on the bread," he told it, and Hiro fluttered obediently to his shoulder, murmuring something in Niou's mind about the slice being warm and soft.

_'You should eat,'_ Hiro chided Niou. _'It'd be a pity to waste the efforts of the kitchen. Besides, it'd be best to eat something before you travel. One can't go far on simply tea with nearly a million sugar cubes dissolved into it.'_

Niou raised an eyebrow, turning his head slightly so that he could look at Hiro out of the corner of his eye. "Marui can do it," he said, and received a glare and a sharp jab in the ribs from the addressed man as a result of it. Shrugging, Niou ignored him and picked up the slice of bread, biting into it, silently planning on his revenge prank that would get Marui back for making his ribs ache (Marui's jabs were always surprisingly painful).

Fresh-baked bread, Niou decided, was probably one of the best things in the world. Niou liked the way it filled his mouth with comfortable warmth, never scalding like soups and stews did, and he loved how its crust would be hard and crisp but its center would be chewy and moist. In Niou's opinion, it was a wonderful blend of contrasts.

As breakfast drew to a close, Niou rose from his seat and padded off to the kitchens. The head cook glanced up from her pot of stew, offering him a small smile as she did so. "Yukimura-sama said that you'd be needing food that'll last you a few days." Niou nodded at her words and watched from the side as she yelled at one of the girls who worked under her in the kitchen to fetch the prepared provisions.

The girl soon appeared with a haversack, presenting it to the head cook who handed it to Niou. "There's bread, cheese, meat, and several containers of water should you not find other water sources. I also slipped in a flagon of apple cordial."

Niou flashed her a charming smile. "Apple, you say? Wonderful; that's my favorite."

The cook chuckled, nodding knowingly. Having had Niou in her kitchens on many occasions for provisions for his missions, she had long since gotten the gist of what he liked and would usually slip a few of those favorites into his pack along with the standard rations that Yukimura told her. "If you look hard enough, you'll find a few candies tucked into the side pocket along with a wrapped package of herbs," she told him. "Mind you, those are cooking herbs. If you want healing herbs, stop by the Infirmary before you leave to who-knows-where, understand?"

"Yes, ma'am," Niou said dutifully, giving her a cheery wave and tipping a wink at the girl who had brought the haversack. She flushed bright red as Niou left the kitchens.

As it turned out, Niou did not need to go to the Infirmary for herbs. Yanagi was waiting for him outside of the doors to his chambers, holding a package in his hands. "You were taking your time in the kitchens," Yanagi said, a small frown on his features. "Really, Niou, you should learn to stop flirting with those maids down there."

Niou shrugged, opening the door and slipping into his quarters, gesturing for Yanagi to follow, which he did. The food haversack went into his travelling bag, and Yanagi handed over his package. "I can't help it if all the kitchen maids are pretty," Niou said easily, slipping the package into the bag along with the food and the already packed clothes and weapons. Yanagi sighed, shaking his head while Niou grinned cheekily up at him. "What's in the package, Yanagi?"

"Herbs," was Yanagi's simple answer, "rosemary, sorrel, and others included. I expect that you won't need them, since the last few packages that I've sent with you haven't even been touched, but it's always good to have them in the case of something wrong happening."

Niou shut his bag and hefted it in one hand. It wasn't heavy, and didn't bulge, so his movements wouldn't be restricted. Setting the bag down, he vanished into one of the back rooms to change into his travelling clothes, leaving Yanagi to the task of casting wards over his bag.

"All set?" Niou asked, reappearing moments afterwards, out of his flowing court robes and into a simple tunic and a pair of pants.

"Yes, everything's well," Yanagi said, although he produced yet another package and handed it to Niou. "A gift… from Yukimura. He says you'll know when and how to use it when the time is right."

"Is that so?" Niou asked, placing it into his bag and slinging it over his shoulder as the two men stepped outside. When it was securely in place he clasped a brown traveler's cloak over it. "Tell him that I said 'thanks,' will you, Yanagi?" He breezed out of the room without even sparing him another glance, Hiro trailing behind him.

When Niou was out of sight Yanagi looked down at his hands. His fingers were trembling. "Yukimura," he said softly, and the man stepped out from behind a pillar, although it seemed like he had materialized from thin air. "What exactly was your… gift?"

Yukimura chuckled lightly. "As expected of you, Yanagi," he said softly, a look of fond admiration in his blue-violet eyes. "It was powerful, wasn't it?" Yanagi nodded in quiet agreement as Yukimura continued. "It is a power that is only meant for Niou."

A far-off look invaded Yukimura's face, and Yanagi bit back his questions. "Niou…" Yukimura finally said, closing his eyes as a soft breeze caressed his wavy locks of hair. "Yanagi, do you agree with me when I say that to move on to the future, one must conquer his past?"

"Yes, Yukimura, I do agree with that."

"Then, Yanagi, my gift to Niou is the key for him moving on to his future."

***

Niou preferred to travel by foot as opposed by horse. Sure, horses could travel a lot farther and a lot faster than people could in the same amount of time, but caring for the horse on the journey became tedious, time-consuming. Not to mention that in Niou's line of work, he needed to move quietly, not just quickly. If it was only him, he could instantly conceal himself. Niou also had a few magic spells at his disposal, although he rarely used them. Using magic drained him; he simply wasn't the type cut out to use magic.

"I'm in a good mood, Hiro. Want to hear a legend?" Niou asked the Illusionary on his shoulder suddenly. As soon as the two had left the gates of the capitol and onto the wide dirt path worn with ruts left by wagons and the footprints of people, Niou had lifted up his hood, hiding his face and hair, and Hiro had nestled himself just within the folds of brown, cotton cloth.

_'Which legend?'_ Hiro asked, shifting closer to Niou's neck. Only the faintest glow of yellow could be seen, as it was covered by Niou's hair. Unless one looked closely, they wouldn't even notice Hiro and his glow. All they would see was a lean, cloaked figure, carrying nothing more than a walking stick, travelling along the path like the multitude of others.

"The one of travelling, of course," Niou answered, letting himself get jostled along in the crowd. "Once, there was a man by the name of Ishida Tetsu. He and his family were among the first people to settle in the newly-formed mountains. Initially, Tetsu was content with life in his mountain village, but as the days passed, he began to grow restless.

"'What if there were other places like this in the world?' he asked his family and friends. 'Surely there must be others, for the world is a big place!' His questions were met with scorn, for the others believed that there was only their small spot on the mountains that was habitable. And besides, they argued, had not _all_ of the demons merged together to form the mountains? If that was so, then there could be no other habitable places for humans.

"However, Tetsu was adamant. After days of planning, he took a bag and filled it with provisions, scrolls of parchment, quills, and ink, and set off down the mountains with only his horse as a companion. At the base of the mountains, he filled a small pouch with earth and with it as his only reminder of the mountains he had called 'home', set off across the dry cracked lands."

_'And did Tetsu ever find what he was looking for?'_ Hiro asked curiously.

"He did, actually," Niou said, not minding the interruption. By this time, the travelers immediately surrounding him had turned their attentions to him, listening intently as Niou told his story. "Tetsu found another place that was like his mountain home, yet different at the same time. However, he was not satisfied with only this one place, and as soon as his horse was freshened up and he had recorded all about the place he had stumbled upon onto his parchments, he bid the place farewell, taking another small pouch of earth with him as he did so.

"To this day, they say that his spirit and that of his horse's roam the lands, forever searching for new places that life could live on. And at each spot, he writes about its unique characteristics and takes a bag of earth before moving on."

Niou paused, looking thoughtful. "The legend goes on to say that when Tetsu had had so many bags of earth that he could no longer carry them all with him, he deposited them in three secret places for safekeeping. Every few years, he returns to those places, adding in the new pouches of earth to his ever growing collection.

"As long as Tetsu continues to travel with his horse in search of new places, we on earth travel by foot to the places that Tetsu had already travelled. And that is why we travel today. If Tetsu had been like the others in his village, he would have never discovered so many new places, or have gone to them in the fist place. And if that had happened, we would have known nothing more than what was in our yards. What was outside of them we would have termed as simply being a 'wasteland'."

Whistling softly to himself, Niou turned off the main path and onto a smaller one, leaving behind the streams of people and wagons that travelled on the big road.

***

From the shadows that had gathered in the corners of the spacious room, a single creature disentangled itself from the clinging darkness and trotted forward. _'Master,'_ it hissed, gradually changing from its wispy form into something that was a bit more solid, streaking towards a single young man who was sitting on a chair, staring out the window with a bored expression on his perfectly chiseled face.

_'Master,'_ the creature purred, now fully formed, no longer having any parts of wispy shadow trailing after it as it moved. It possessed an elegant, elongated body that was covered with shiny onyx-colored scales, complete with a small set of horns and a mane of dark hair that ran along its spine. A pair of red eyes, shining like rubies, blinked as it scurried up the legs of the chair and twined gently around his master's neck. _'Master, I have returned from my trip.'_

The man turned away from the window, reaching up with one hand. The creature rested its chin in his hand as he contemplated what the creature had just told him. "How was it, Haru?" he finally asked, reaching up and stroking its head.

Haru purred some more, enjoying the attention its master was lavishing upon it before answering. _'The little Illusionary has made its choice. It is an assassin named Niou.'_

"An assassin…" his master echoed. Dark golden orbs narrowed slightly behind a pair of rimless spectacles. "How pitiful… pitting an assassin against a mage. He won't last long, whoever he is." He fell silent for a few moments before speaking again. "Describe him to me, Haru. Don't miss anything; I like full reports."

_'Master, you know how he is already,'_ Haru murmured, his tail flicking lazily against his master's shoulder. _'After all, do we not share the same eyes? Do we not share the same ears?'_

His master laughed, rubbing Haru's head a bit more in what could have been close to affection, but was not exactly affection. "Indeed, we do," he agreed, "for you _are _my eyes and ears in the places that I do not feel like getting to."

He fell silent then, resting his chin on the hand that wasn't currently rubbing his little spy on the head. "Niou…" he murmured softly, tasting the name on his tongue. A small smile made its way across his lips. "If he's who I think he is, then I do hope that he's different from that father of his," he said, and this time it was he was purring, while Haru was silent, quietly waiting for orders on what he should do next.

The man stood up with a flourish of maroon-colored silk, that small smile widening until it had become a smirk. "It's been fifteen years since I've had any encounter with one from the Niou family. I had thought that I had destroyed them all at _that_ event."

Haru blinked ruby eyes as his tail curled, feeling his master's hatred and rage rise. All of a sudden, though, when he would have expected his master to snap and destroy something (as he had developed the habit of doing so when he was greatly angered) in the room, his master threw his head back and laughed. Haru quivered slightly; his master _rarely_ laughed. Was the Niou family really that important to his master?

"How fun," his master breathed, when he had stopped laughing. There was a malicious gleam in his eyes that could have rendered the most powerful of warriors to stone. "It appears as though Fate does not like for her chosen to be destroyed so easily."

_'Shall I kill this Niou, Master?'_

"No, no… that is my privilege and mine alone, Haru," his master said softly, moving to the window so that he could look out into the fields where peasant farmers toiled. The village that he had claimed current residence in had been quiet lately; there had been no new travelers after dark, but even had there been, he would have had no more use for them. His Shadow Labyrinth had been completed, with many thanks to that last unfortunate traveler who had set foot into the village. "I must be given the honor of destroying the last barrier that is between me and my goal," he murmured. "Once one of the three Pillars is mine, it won't be long before the other two follow."

He turned away from the window and covered the glass panes with the heavy curtains with a snap of his wrists. "Haru, how I've longed for this day," he said quietly. "When their precious Pillars are destroyed… maybe then they'll understand everything that I've had to go through."

He strode to the door and opened it, stepping into the carpeted hall and making his way towards the marble staircase. "Haru, I have decided your next mission."

_'Do tell me, then, Master.'_

His master's glasses gleamed, with golden eyes vanishing behind the glass. "Take a few of my best and infiltrate the capitol. Find its weaknesses. The capitol has the best data records in all of Rikkai. Obtaining them means capturing the capitol itself."

Haru leapt gracefully off of his master's shoulders, beginning to form back into his original, wispy form that was comprised of mainly shadows. _'As you wish,'_ he purred.

_'I will do everything that you ask of me, Master Yagyuu. I will never abandon you like **they** did.'_

* * *

_There is darkness in every mortal person. For every person fears, and fear is an invitation for welcoming thoughts that will alleviate fear, be them what we call 'good' or 'evil.' Yet at the same time, there is light in every mortal, for every person is entitled to hope. But which is more powerful? Can light and dark coexist? Darkness can be thwarted by the lighting of a single candle, yet in a single room, the lighting of a candle will only illuminate the center of the room, leaving the corners in shadow._

* * *

A/N: Argh... this took way longer to write than I thought it would. Why? Why?! *sighs*

Notice how Yagyuu has a minion named 'Haru' and Niou has one named 'Hiro'? Anyone want to guess why (it's rather obvious, I think, seeing as I suck at being subtle)?

**Reviews** are loved and appreciated as always! Thank you!


	4. Aemis

**_Chapter 3 – Aemis_**

Haru and his few selected companions slinked along the ground, creeping stealthily from shadow to shadow, whether it be the large one cast by a tree or the tiny one cast by a moving ant. In their shadowy forms, detecting them was difficult by even the most skilled of mages. They were creatures born from the shadows; the shadows and all places dark were they moved most freely in.

_'Careful, now,'_ Haru murmured, his voice wind playing gently through empty air. _'We're nearing the capitol.'_ In reality, Haru realized that there was nothing much that he had to fear from the capitol. Even though most of its inhabitants were trained well in their respective fighting methods and were formidable opponents for anyone, Haru and his kind were rarely detected, and thus rarely attacked.

_'__Be careful of the mage they call Yanagi,_' Yagyuu had cautioned Haru and the five other shadow demons Haru had selected for the mission of infiltrating the capitol. _'If there should be any bit of detecting it would most likely be from him. He might not be able to see you, but he may feel your presence. Always have at least one of you keeping an eye on him.' _Haru relayed the message to his gathering, the six of them scrabbling quickly up a tree to avoid a group of young children and their adult supervisor, all of which were carrying baskets of herbs. It must have been one of those daily trips in which villages within a half day's journey to the capitol would get groups of volunteers to visit them. The young girls would be set to work helping out the local healers and village women while the boys were helping a bit in the fields. Being mostly orphans with no homes of their own to go to anymore, this was a way for them to get used to village life so that they could go and establish a home for themselves in the nearby villages when they were grown and could leave the safety of the capitol.

_'Asides from Yanagi, I don't believe that there is anyone we need to keep an eye on,'_ Haru murmured, tail flicking idly against the tree branch that he was perched upon. _'Sanada is strong with the sword and very quick and I heard he usually has some poison or another on his sword to make his attacks even stronger. His detecting skills are a bit slower, though, I will have to say.'_

One of his companions nodded his head, ruby red eyes fixated upon the road underneath them as the last of the group passed them by. _'That Marui, the archery master… doesn't he have something like sacred arrows?'_

Haru hissed lightly in agreement. _'Yes, yes… but we should be fine as he is forbidden from using his sacred arrows unless he absolutely needs to. It taxes his body, Master Yagyuu says, and that's why Yukimura forbade him from using it regularly.' _He fell silent for a moment, springing down to the ground and landing lightly on his four paws when there was no one on the path anymore.

Wordlessly, all six slipped into the shadows, streaking silently towards the unsuspecting capitol, diving into the shadows cast by the protective walls. Within moments, they were inside, where Haru promptly split them up. All of them would meet up at the shadows that pooled near the main gates at sundown and head back to their Master with their report.

The last one to dive into a shadow in order to snoop around the area sat in the shadow, merged with the darkness formed by a stone fountain, watching quietly as a few children ran past him and around the fountain, playing a spirited game of tag. He was gone from the fountain's shadow when they made a complete circle around it, jumping from the shadows cast by each of the children until he reached the gateway to one of the many gardens. Without a sound, he padded into the garden, making himself at home in the shadow of a rosebush.

He was not alone in the garden.

Marui glanced up from his book, lavender eyes fixated on the skies, a small frown on his face, unusual as he was usually so cheerful and always grinning. The children were getting a bit loud and rowdy in their antics, and Marui had thus retreated to one of the side gardens for a bit of peace and quiet. That, and Yanagi had lent him a book on protective spells, which Marui was determined to master. He could just imagine his friend Niou popping up from behind the bench he was seated on and make some stupid remark about him and spells, resulting in the two of them getting into some argument or another. A smile flickered across his face for a brief moment before it died away and was replaced by the small frown.

It darkened as he studied the sky, snapping his book shut. Something wasn't right… he couldn't exactly place his finger on it despite the genius that he was, but he knew that something wasn't right. Having something bother him like this destroyed all of the tranquility that he had been experiencing just a few minutes ago, and he knew that trying to read would be futile. He'd save the reading for later and have Jackal help him practice; he was good at protective spells.

A breeze blew past him at that moment, and his reddish-pink hair was tousled so that it blew past his face, tickling his cheeks. His eyes closed and a soft sigh escaped his lips. The wind… it was a west wind that was blowing.

"It'd be easier to enjoy this wind if I didn't feel like something was so _wrong_," Marui sighed in exasperation. He tucked his book away and glanced at the large bow that was seated on the bench next to him. "Do you feel it, too, I wonder?" he asked, reaching out to place a hand on the smooth curve of the bow. It remained cold and silent under his hand, and he gave a defeated sigh, taking it off.

"You still insist on talking to that big weapon of yours?"

Marui glanced up to see Jackal stride towards him. He grinned and gave a wave to the Master of Defenses, standing up as he did so and picking up the bow. "You know I do," he said, a cheerful smile on his face at the appearance of his friend. "But it hasn't responded in years, no matter what I say." His face dropped to a dejected sigh as he studied the bow that he held. He could remember, very clearly, that it had once been warm under his hand, and pulsing with a vibrant power. Where had that power gone, he wondered… why had the warmth seeped away?

Jackal, too, studied the bow, before shaking his head and sitting down. Marui followed suit, resting the bow against his leg. "I'm no master at the bow and all of its parts," Jackal said, "but don't you think you should give up on calling to it?" He knew that Aemis meant a lot to his friend, but seeing the dejected look on Marui's face every time Aemis refused to answer him, and seeing the look of helplessness on his face when Yukimura told him to leave Aemis and use a bow that he could actually handle… Jackal just felt that Marui would be better off if he let it go.

Marui was silent for a few moments before he shook his head. "I can't," he said simply. "You can ask me to give up anything, but I just can't give up Aemis. Aemis is all I have; I'm nothing without it."

He stared over the garden, looking thoughtful. "Aemis has been in my family for generations and is passed from mother to daughter. However, when there are no girls, it is given to the eldest boy. But the thing about Aemis is that it won't work for everyone. It's not like one of those weapons where if you're not the chosen one, you can't lift it or something. Anyone can fire an arrow from it, but unless Aemis chooses you, you can't fire the sacred arrows."

"Wouldn't it be better for you not to fire one, since you're body can't keep up with the strain?" Jackal asked, ever the practical one. "After all, even though Aemis contributes half of the power, its wielder needs to give up the other half." He had no idea how exactly Marui's favorite weapon worked, but he had observed him for long enough to get the gist of it.

"Sometimes you need one," Marui said curtly, standing up and taking Aemis in his hand once more. "I'll be going, now. I want to finish the book that Yanagi gave me. Do you want to help me with protective spells after dinner today?"

Jackal gave a nod of agreement as Marui turned to leave. However, Marui turned around before he was even halfway to the gate to the courtyard. "Just watch, Jackal. Aemis will respond one day. I can't give up now." With that, he was gone, vanishing around the corner, leaving Jackal alone on the bench in the garden.

Intrigued by this Marui and the large weapon that he carried, the small demon abandoned his shadow under the rosebush and slunk after him, exiting the garden unnoticed.

***

_'What do you have to report?'_ Haru asked, seated comfortably in the shadow thrown by the gateway that separated the capitol from the fields that surrounded it. His tail curled over his front paws, ruby eyes studying his companions. Haru was not particularly pleased with the results of his trip, and this was noted by the occasional angry flick of his tail, and the way eyes were brighter than usual, a clear sign of his displeasure. He had gone straight to the three strongest of Rikkai, deducing that they would be the most likely in producing the answers that his master wanted.

He had been sorely disappointed. The three of them discussed nothing about records of Rikkai, or at the very least, anything about the Niou that had so captured his master's attention. All Haru had heard was talk about Rikkai in general: some villages had a crop failure and should have aid sent to them, bandits were becoming bolder and travelling further on their raids, pirates had taken a liking to villages dotting the coast of the Earan Sea, etc. The shadow demon had slunk away after a few minutes, thoroughly disgusted with those people and their ability to leak out crucial information.

The others had had similar luck. Not a thing was dropped about the capitol's weaknesses, and when some of them had decided to search for information on the three Pillars, they had found nothing except legends telling of their might. To them, legends were nothing, simply words pieced together into a story to make some sort of sense to ignorant people. They didn't spend much time with them.

_'Master Yagyuu will be displeased,'_ one of the demons hissed nervously, shifting his weight between his four paws, moving restlessly about in his area of shadow. There were murmurs of assent between the rest of the demons, although Haru remained silent.

_'I saw Aemis,'_ the one who had tailed Marui all afternoon chose to announce, and all nervous shifting ceased. Everyone's attention was on him, and Haru motioned for him to continue. _'Its current wielder is a man by the name of Marui Bunta, however, it hasn't answered him in years, as far as I can tell.'_

Haru's eyes gleamed. _'Aemis… the bow of the Wind Goddess,'_ he breathed._ 'It used to be in Master Yagyuu's possession until it was stolen by one from the Marui family generations back,'_ he hissed. _'He will be pleased to note that it is currently here and rejecting its wielder. It is a suitable fate for one who comes from a family of thieves.'_

"Who's from a family of thieves?" came a voice, and all six jumped, hissing in slight alarm. There was Marui, standing no more than a few feet away from them, Aemis loaded and drawn. "You know, I prefer it when people talk trash about my family in front of my face. That way, it's easier to smash them."

Haru growled lowly, enraged. The impudence of that human… trying to use his master's own weapon against his master's creatures! Haru couldn't stand it. _'Smash all you want,'_ he snarled, _'but in the end it will be your body that wastes away in agony, not ours.'_

For answer, Marui pulled back the bowstring. Yukimura would kill him if he fired an arrow, but this was too good of an opportunity to pass up. Just that afternoon Aemis had been cold and lifeless in his hands. Now, it was warm, almost burning into his palms, and he knew, without a doubt, that Aemis had finally answered him after years of waiting. Why, he did not know, but the answer in itself was enough to satisfy him.

Haru's jaws opened, revealing sharply pointed teeth that were bared as he prepared to defend himself. Five similar mouths opened as backs arched. Each of them knew that they couldn't escape until the current arrow was released, but when that arrow was released, one of them wouldn't make it back to his master. Aemis was a bow whose arrows never missed their marks, as long as the one who fired the arrow was the one who Aemis chose as its master. And there was no doubt that Marui was Aemis's chosen one; Haru could feel the power that rolled off of the man. That, combined with Aemis's initial power, was a force to be reckoned with that Haru feared.

Haru's jaws snapped together so that his teeth produced a sharp clacking sound._ 'Move!'_ he hissed, and all of them scattered. Marui took aim and let his arrow fly.

Yukimura, passing through the area with Jackal, discussing defensive spells with his Defense Master, looked up in startled surprise at the whistling sound that was distinctively an arrow. Jackal, too, look startled as he caught sight of Marui. Within seconds Yukimura had left his side and was speeding towards Marui, calling to him.

He had not taken more than two steps before he was forced to stop and shield his eyes, Jackal, too, as the shining arrow hit its mark with an explosion of white light. What followed it was an unearthly screeching sound. Haru paused in his retreat, looking over his shoulder. His tail lashed furiously; one of them had been struck, and Marui had another arrow fitted into his bow, clearly intent on taking out the rest of them, despite already beginning to show signs of fatigue. Growling in frustration, he turned, and with a jerk of his head, left with the other four who remained.

As for the unfortunate demon, he had reared up, roaring furiously, the arrow embedded deeply in his shoulder. Dark blood flowed from the wound as he tried furiously to dislodge it. The magic embedded in the arrow was eating away at the dark material that made up his flesh; if he did not remove it soon, it would be the death of him. He hissed, going into a frenzied dance of pain, scrabbling at the arrow with his paws, although he was only successful in making it go deeper.

"The reason why Aemis is so affective in battle…" Yukimura murmured, and Jackal turned to him. "It is said that Aemis was a gift bestowed upon the ancestor of the Marui family line from the Goddess of the Wind, eons ago. During that time, the land was plagued with demons. In an effort to rid the demons from the land, the Goddess gave her most prized possession to the girl, along with its guardian, the West Wind, Zephyr."

"Zephyr…" Jackal echoed oh-so-intelligently, looking lost and confused amidst Yukimura's explanation.

"Jackal, you know that when one fires an arrow from Aemis, Aemis contributes half of the power and the user contributes the other in order for the arrow to be 'pure,' right?"

Yukimura continued before Jackal could defend himself and say that he knew. "The legend of Aemis goes on to say this: when the Goddess of Wind bequeathed her most prized possession, she infused it with her own power. In essence, Aemis is a limitless reserve of strength, for as long as the wind blows, it will be able to draw upon the power which she infused in it. That is how Aemis itself is able to contribute half of the power in each arrow that it fires.

"The other half is actually not the wielder's own power. Zephyr, as the West Wind and Aemis's guardian, actually fuses with the user. Like Aemis, it has power that will never run out, so it is actually Zephyr's power that gives the arrow its complete power. In truth, the wielder can have absolutely no magical abilities at all but still be able to fire the sacred arrows.

"As for Aemis choosing its own master, that goes along the principle that it has a heart of its own. With so much power stored in it, when in the wrong hands, Aemis can end up causing a lot of harm. It seems as if the Goddess knew that so much power concentrated in one place could lead to as many bad results as good, so she turned a portion of that power into a 'heart,' which can only be activated in the presence of Zephyr. When Marui talks about Aemis 'answering' him, it is the power of Aemis calling out to the power of Zephyr."

There was a dry chuckling sound from Marui, which made Yukimura stop talking. Jackal watched worriedly as his long-time friend turned towards them, rocking unsteadily on his feet. "There is a catch, you know," Marui rasped out. "The body will still be drained from using the weapon, and repeated use shortens the lifespan of the user."

Yukimura was at his side in an instant, catching him effortlessly as he half collapsed against him. Jackal was not given much time to ponder about how he got there so fast; Yukimura was motioning him to come help take Marui to the infirmary with a nod of his head.

"What about the demon?" Jackal asked, eyeing the silent dark mass warily, which had by this time stopped thrashing about except for the occasional twitch of its sinewy body.

"Leave him to me. Make sure Marui gets enough rest and tell the healers he's not to be out of bed until nightfall tomorrow at the earliest," Yukimura answered easily. "May I have Aemis? There are a few things I need to do, first, before he can have it back."

Horror crossed Jackal's face. "You're not going to destroy it, are you?" he asked, to which Yukimura looked surprised.

"Destroy? Of course not! There is simply a task that I must do which requires it. Now, off you go!" Reluctantly, Jackal left, half carrying half dragging his unconscious friend along. Yukimura waited until they were gone from his sight before turning his attention to the demon, who looked up at him and hissed softly.

He knelt besides its fallen body, Aemis held comfortably in his lap. "There is another reason why the user of Aemis will always be weary upon using it," he said softly. "You know, don't you?" he asked, caressing the smooth curve of the bow.

"You cannot hide from me, Zephyr."

***

Niou let himself into the tavern of the first village that he came to. Night had already fallen, and he decided that he had walked enough for that day. The warmth of the tavern was welcome on his face and hands; the nights were getting chilly. A quick glance around the brightly lit room found that the tables were all occupied. Niou sighed softly to himself; it looked like he would have to be eating with the company of other people tonight.

"Do you mind if I sit here?" Niou asked a young man, gesturing to the empty seat next to the man. He shook his head, and Niou slid into the spot. He could feel curious gazes on him from all over the inn. While all sorts of people entered taverns, it was rare to find someone completely cloaked and hooded. Niou kept his traveler's cloak on his shoulders, reaching up to make sure that his hood was up and that his face, for the most part, was left in shadow. He rested his walking stick next to him so that it leaned upon his thigh.

The mistress of the tavern bustled up to him, wearing a burgundy-colored dress, a black bodice laced on top of it. A starch white apron was tied around her waist, and her dark hair was piled into a messy bun atop her head. "Can I get you something, mister?" she asked, giving her strange-looking guest an unmasked look of curiosity before flashing him a smile.

Niou handed a few coins to her, which she took and slid into the pocket of her apron. "I'd like a room for the night and a hot meal," he said simply.

She bobbed her head, telling him to wait a few minutes for his meal. "I'll have your room ready, soon, too," she said. "Please be patient." He gave a faint wave of his hand to show that he understood and she left, leaving Niou alone to his own thoughts.

She had been gone no more than a few minutes before the door of the tavern burst open. One of the villagers, a young boy about twelve or so years of age, stood in the doorway, half-doubled over as he tried to regain his breathing. He must have been running hard and fast from wherever he had started from.

The youth's head snapped up, and Niou could see his eyes, widened with awe and terror swimming in the black depths. "There's… there's…" he panted, trying to speak but stumbling over his words. There were encouraging sounds from the guests in the tavern and the boy took a few breaths to calm himself down so that he could form a coherent sentence.

"There's a dragon floating above the capitol!" he cried out.

Immediately, there was the collective sound of chairs scraping against the wooden floor as everyone jumped up, Niou included. The poor boy had barely enough time to jump out of the way before he was trampled by everyone's attempt to rush out the door. He watched fearfully as they stampeded past him before sinking onto the ground, breathing heavily, looking up when Niou stopped in front of him.

"Are you sure that it was a dragon and that it was above the capitol?" Niou asked. The boy nodded mutely in agreement, seeming to have lost his voice after his outburst, and Niou slipped out of the tavern, turning his face in the direction of the capitol.

Nervous murmuring sounded from all around him. The villages had already seen the spectacle, and were crowded in the streets, pointing to the huge white beast that Niou could easily see. The dragon in the air was shimmering silver color, when it tossed its head, Niou thought that it was the most beautiful thing that he had ever seen in his life.

Hiro slid out from beneath his hood, perching onto his head. _'Zephyr…' _the Illusionary murmured.

"Zephyr?" Niou echoed, curious. Did Hiro know that dragon?

_'Zephyr, the West Wind,'_ Hiro answered, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. _'It is the Guardian of the great bow Aemis, but hasn't been in his true form in many years. I was beginning to think that I'd never get to see Zephyr like that again.'_

Niou processed this all in his head before something dawned on him. Aemis… that was that big bow that Marui was so attached to! But he had never heard Marui mention anything about a 'west wind.' "How come?" Niou asked, and Hiro shifted from the top of his head to his shoulder. "How come Zephyr hasn't been in his true state for so long?" _And how come Marui never mentioned anything about such a big dragon?_ he wondered. When he got back, Marui was going to go through a thorough interrogation.

_'Zephyr… was captured,_' Hiro answered, _'in an attempt to regain Aemis with the help of Marui Yukari, the current Marui Bunta's great-grandmother. They succeeded, although she had not long to savor her victory. She went to take Zephyr back, in which she was killed.'_

Hiro slipped back into Niou's hood as Niou reentered the tavern, sitting down. A plate of hot food was placed in front of him, and he nodded his thanks, although he didn't touch any of it right away, even though the stew smelled wondrously delicious and the butter was melting gently into the two slices of thick bread, baked with almonds and walnuts. There was something Hiro wasn't telling him, and so he waited patiently (or as patiently as he could with such good food so close to him).

Finally, Hiro decided to speak again. _'My master… my master once held the West Wind captive.'_

Hearing this, Niou picked up his spoon and started to eat.

***

Six onyx-colored crystals sat in narrow stone dishes on the table in front of Yagyuu. The mage had moved himself from the empty room he had occupied previously, preferring the spacious library in this huge mansion of a home. It had been a good idea to take out the nobleman and personify him. Not only did the big house offer the ideal lodging (Yagyuu found that he quite liked the armchairs in the drawing room), but the villagers, thinking that he was the nobleman or at least someone of noble birth, gave him a wide berth and generally left him alone.

It was fine with Yagyuu whether they decided to acknowledge him or not. He didn't need them except to experiment and perfect his spells, the latter of which he did quite often under the guise of an unknown sorcerer.

The crystal in the dish farthest from Yagyuu suddenly started to quiver, shaking back and forth, clinking against the sides of the dish. A few moments passed, and then the crystal shattered. Yagyuu was not entirely surprised.

"After all, it's difficult to control something that is not directly in front of you," he mused quietly. "The further it goes, and the longer it is away, makes it gain a sense of freedom that becomes troublesome."

His glasses glinted sharply in the darkness as, with a wave of his hand, he lit the candles in the library's chandelier. "Zephyr… the West Wind. It seems as if you no longer think me worthy of being your master," he murmured, voice dangerously soft and soothing. Cupping the shattered pieces of the crystal, he held them in his palm for a brief while before fisting his hand. When he uncurled his fingers from the shards, there was nothing but dust in his palm, still hot and smoking from the amount of power he had applied to its destruction.

Stepping out of the library and onto the balcony that the glass doors set into its western wall led out to, he tossed the particles into the night sky, where a breeze picked them up and sent them along their way to a place where Yagyuu did not know nor did he care. There was a great amount of power in the air that night. Yagyuu could feel it, and it made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up.

Soon, an hour at most, Haru and the other shadow demons he had dispatched would return. They would come straight to him, all but Haru quivering in fear that he should be angry and punish them. The corners of his lips curved up into something that was between a smirk and a smile.

Why would he need to punish his devoted minions? They had done what he had wanted them to… granted, they didn't find any useful documents and records, but they had seen something even better.

They had found that bow, Aemis, which that wench Yukari had stolen from him years ago. After her death (he had taken great measures to ensure that he made her's as slow and as painful as possible), he had lost all traces of Aemis's power. His minions had been sent far and wide, scouring the area, but found nothing, not even the tiniest scrap of power was detected.

To add upon that failure, Zephyr, the stubborn fool that he was, had refused to listen to his commands, even after witnessing the death of his beloved mistress. Yagyuu had had no choice but to infuse some of his power into him, bending and twisting the dragon's own will in order to better suit his purposes. His original plan had not had tainting Zephyr into a demon in it. Yagyuu had wanted to used Zephyr's power in its full form; when he was changed into a demon, his powers got… condensed, if he had to describe it in one word.

Resting his hands on the balcony rail, he cut off his connections with Haru. He had seen all that he had needed to see from what had happened at the capitol. He had heard all that he needed to hear. Aemis, which had formally been silent to even its chosen master, had finally answered. His smirk grew wider as he recalled the awesome power with which it fired one of its sacred arrows. Even without its Guardian, the bow still packed quite a punch. Aemis was indeed a wonderful weapon.

"The first failure was because I did not have both the weapon and the Guardian," he said, leaning forward so that he was leaning just slightly over the balcony's edge. The village was quiet, and his eyes roved around the dark countryside, not seeking anything in particular but simply enjoying how wonderfully _dark_ everything was, the way it was cast in shadow. "Clever, weren't you, Yukari, for hiding the bow with your heir and coming to face me on your own. You thought I could be changed, didn't you?"

He looked up at the dark sky, at the cold moon and the stars, as if they could give him the answer. Hearing none, a look of smug satisfaction crossed his face. "I can't be changed, you silly, silly girl."

He looked down at his hands, studying the way his fingers gripped at the cold stone of the railing. "You were such a foolish believer, just like the rest of them were," he said quietly. "Wishful thinking gets one nowhere."

He turned away from the view that the balcony gave him and stalked inside, leaving the door open. Giving a passing glance at the candles that lit the library, he snuffed them with a lift of his fingers before leaving the library. He was gone for no more than a few minutes when a warm breeze, different from the other cold ones of the night, blew into the room. The candles flared up slightly before dying down, but the warmth lingered in the room.

However, that, too, soon died away, leaving the library cold and dark, an exact replica of its master's heart.

* * *

_A person can change a thousand times; they are not concrete. It is the fool who believes that he will never change, no matter how long he lives. A person cannot change, but he can forget. When he says that he does not change, it is because he can no longer remember what he was like before. Forgetting is a more frightening concept than changing._

* * *

A/N: Because I believe Marui doesn't get as much screentime as he deserves, he gets an awesome bow and an even awesomer guardian-dragon. But honestly, Aemis and Zephyr will be very important to this story. They're not just in there for kicks (although Marui is awesome and we all love him).

Reviews are always loved! Click the green button in order to give Marui an arrow which he can add to his quiver so that he can fire whenever Yukimura lets him out of the Infirmary. ^_^


	5. War God's Minions

**_Chapter 4 – War God's Minions_**

Niou was gone from the tavern at the break of dawn the next day. The only evidence that he showed that he had ever been there to stay the night was the rumpled bed sheets and the bronze coins that he left on the nightstand as a tip to the girl who would be coming by soon to tidy up the room. Splashing some water onto his face as a quick wake-up call from the stone washbasin set into the wall opposite the bed, he donned his traveler's cloak and left the tavern, padding along the cobbled streets of the village. Hiro was huddled next to his neck, using Niou's hood and hair to shield himself from the early morning chill and any curious eyes, intent on getting some more sleep. Niou didn't try to stop him; Hiro wasn't a morning Illusionary, if there existed such a thing.

Niou slid quietly into the village square, where a few of the earlier-rising farmers were already setting up stalls, carefully setting up their displays of fresh produce. One of them even had a few chickens, kept in a pen where they clucked and scratched, wanting to be free.

"Eggs, sir?" asked the chicken seller. "Fresh eggs are great ways to start one's day. If you're travelling, I also have a few hard-boiled eggs, as well." The farmer had judged Niou well, seeing the cloak that had clearly been through all sorts of weather that only a traveler ventured into on a daily basis.

Underneath his hood, the majority of his face shadowed by the cloth, Niou quirked a brow in faint amusement. This was one very well-prepared farmer. But since he hadn't eaten breakfast (he hadn't wanted to linger at the tavern longer than he needed to), he purchased an egg from the man, letting his gaze wander around the rest of the square after making his purchase. There wasn't any else that could be easy to eat on the trip, and he _did_ have his own food store in his bag…

Bidding the farmer farewell Niou strode out of the square and out of the village, cracking the shell of the egg by tapping it against the blade of one of his daggers. Sheathing the dagger, he proceeded to peel the shell away from the egg, dropping the mound of shell off at the side of the path where the earth would reclaim it eventually, eating his meal. The sky was just beginning to lighten up, with faint streaks of pink and gold chasing the indigo away.

Standing there on the path, munching on the egg, Niou was reminded that it was a long time since he had looked at the coming dawn and had had felt nothing but a simple wonder.

"Where to?" he asked softly, swallowing and pulling out his map. He could see Yukimura's neat handwriting besides every significant area, listing a few key facts that he had thought would be good for Niou to know. Niou was touched by the concern, evident from the tiny smile that flitted across his face, even though it only lasted for a few moments.

"We'll be camping outside for a few days," he stated to Hiro, who had by this time fully woken up and had moved to perch attentively on his shoulder. "The next village is a good distance away." The village he had spent the night in had been the farthest of the circle of villages that surrounded the capitol (which made him quite happen with the pace he had set). He set off at a brisk pace, a light spring in his step, actually enjoying the early morning air that greeted him with every step that he took.

Niou didn't stop until noon, pausing to look over his shoulder, a pleased look on his face as he estimated the distance that he had covered. Making himself comfortable on a rock just a little ways from the path, he sorted through his rations, making a small sandwich from a bit of his bread. His dagger nicked a bit of cheese from the generous lump the cook had given him and he spread it onto the bread, inserting a slice of meat, toying somewhat with his knife as he ate. His eyes roved around restlessly as he ate, mindful of every little detail. The path had been surprisingly quiet that morning. At this point, Niou wasn't sure if that was or was not a good thing.

He didn't turn around when there was a rustling in the tall grasses behind him, although his fingers stopped playing with his knife and instead gripped it lightly, a form that was perfect for allowing him to twist and release the blade with deadly accuracy and that had the air of practiced ease.

_'It's a boy,'_ Hiro informed him quietly. _'He's older than the youth who told us of Zephyr last night by a few years and armed with a spear. I can sense no magic from him; he is but a normal villager. He's alone; I can sense no one hiding.'_

Niou said nothing, swallowing the last bite of his sandwich, listening. The boy's breathing was too loud, he was almost panting. And he kept moving the spear, which Niou could tell by the grass rustling ever-so-quietly whenever it touched it. "Did you want something, boy?" he asked, tone bored and almost uncaring although he was very much aware of his surroundings. Even though Hiro stated that he was alone, there was always the chance that some other innocent observer passed by. One could never be too careful.

The boy was silent except for his heavy breathing, before finally speaking, "You sensed me," in a disbelieving tone of voice. Had Niou been 100% confident in his situation ('Never believe that you fully understand someone you've just met, Niou,' Yukimura had drilled into his head often enough) he would have laughed, but as it was, he remained silent.

The boy spoke again after a few long seconds. "If you're one of those new people from the other gangs…" he trailed off, losing a bit of his fire, hesitating. Niou picked up on this immediately but again, made no comment. "I'm not afraid of you!" the boy said sharply. "Just because you have strange black dogs that look like tiny dragons doesn't mean that I have to be scared of you!"

_'Black dogs that look like tiny dragons?'_ Hiro echoed, and Niou felt ill at ease from the tone the Illusionary used. _'The only ones that match that description are Shadow Demons.'_

'Only my Master has Shadow Demons,' was the unspoken end of Hiro's thought.

"Demon handlers," Niou said slowly, blue eyes dark and troubled. He sighed, turning around to face the boy, slipping the dagger out of view into its sheath at the same time. "What is your name?" he asked abruptly.

The boy shrunk back a bit from him, but after a moment remembered that he was supposed to be fierce. "I don't fraternize with the enemy!" was his heated response.

Niou's answer to _that_ was to walk over, grabbing the spear (it looked like a fishing spear, Niou noted as he gave it the briefest of glances) and forcibly yank it from the boy's grip, tossing it carelessly to one side, where it was out of his reach. He had nothing to fear from this boy, he knew, only the information that he carried. "Answer me, and this won't be painful," he growled out lowly, voice a dangerous hiss as he loomed over him. "What do they call you, and what gangs are in this area? And what are these newcomers with black dogs?" Each word he forced out of his mouth was more emphasis then he absolutely needed, but they did the trick.

The boy visibly quivered, and now that he was weaponless, relented easily to Niou. "Jo," he mumbled, shrinking miserably away from Niou. "This area has always been carved out into gangs, each ruling a stretch of land that is dictated by markers like these." He held out a strip of white cloth, gray and dirtied from being out in the elements for a long time. "They don't belong in any village, but wander around these parts, setting up camps at nightfall. They loot the farmhouses and burn the crops whenever they feel inclined. It's been a lot better for the past few years, because of the strength of the capitol, but lately, the talk of the people is that they've acquired new members. Big, burly men, they say, with eyes as cold as the night sky and bodies of steel, each one commanding a score of the black dragon-dogs who possess eyes of rubies. I believe that only the three biggest groups them; five or so of these men each. The numbers vary with each farmer you talk to."

Niou did the math in his head, frowning, not liking the number he was getting. A score of demons for each, five men per group, three groups in all… "Fifteen handlers and three-hundred demons, if the numbers are accurate," Niou muttered, not liking his answer.

_'Shadow Demons in themselves are not strong,'_ Hiro piped up from Niou's shoulder. _'In fact, they can barely do any damage to anyone who can put up even the most primitive of shields. However, their ability to move to nearly any place by melting into the shadows makes them hard to keep up with. It would be difficult for even the most skilled to keep track of three-hundred enemy demons.' _It was not very assuring, even if Niou now knew that they were relatively harmless.

"Whether or not they're demons or dogs, some of the people have been saying that they always feel like something is watching them," Jo said. "It's mostly the farmers' wives and such, at late hours when they were getting ready for bed. They say that they feel a chill go through them and see the faintest shifting of red, but upon closer inspection, everything is normal. My mother said she saw the same thing just the other night."

"There is an old story about Shadow Demons," Niou said finally after a moment of silence from all three. "I remember reading about if from one of Yanagi's books. Before their cores were tainted with darkness, they were the messengers of the aristocratic families that were marked by the gods, valued for their speed and ability to travel through anything as long as there existed a light source, be it sunlight or candlelight. In times of war, they were also the scouts who studied the enemy, gauging their strengths and weaknesses. It wasn't uncommon to use them for communication between spies and their employers, too. Not a lot of people knew about them because they were only used by the selected families in the Rikkai, Seigaku, and Hyoutei kingdoms. At that time, all wars were conducted with kingdoms from other continent, such as the island kingdom of Higa, who knew nothing about them.

"When they were possessed with dark spirits, they began to be used primarily for finding information and infiltrating areas that were otherwise well fortified in order to obtain valuable secrets, which were to be used against the secrets' previous owners. Their new form allowed them more freedom to move, since before it was considerably difficult for them to travel after nightfall. Moonlight wasn't as strong as other sources, after all. Only a select handful report directly to their creator; the others go to their handlers, demons who have the form of humans but retain their demonic qualities of speed and strength, who then report to the creator.

"Some people call them the War God's Minions, since in every event in which they appeared, war broke out shortly afterwards, although this is the first time I've actually heard of something like this actually happening." He frowned, looking thoughtful. "In any case, we should check this out. I don't like the sound of—?"

Niou stopped talking as a wave of cold crashed over him. Blue eyes narrowed into slits, and he half-turned to glance over his shoulder. "Did you need something?" he asked coldly.

The first thing he saw was the ruby eyes, bright and shining, trained on him. Then he saw the pitch black body they belonged to, draped casually over the shoulders of its handler. If he looked closer, he could see more eyes among the grasses, each pair a frighteningly bright blooming red. "Not much, actually," the handler drawled as Niou turned fully around, giving his undivided attention to him. "I was just curious about my Lord's favorite little assassin."

Niou bristled, furious, but before he could make some smart retort the other was speaking again. "You've made me wait, assassin. I don't like waiting." Pearly whites gleamed wickedly from a mocking mouth. "Draw, assassin. I need one thing from you and one thing only, but it's not fun without a fight, is it?" His tongue, a strange clouded blue, flicked out and licked his lips.

"Don't bore me. Otherwise, I might have to break my Lord's rules and kill you before he does so himself."

***

On the windowsill, a red-breasted robin sat, cocking its little head to one side so that it studied the figures in the room with its bright eyes. The ones it was studying paid it not a single glance, and its head tilted to the other side, before its yellow beak opened and a stream of sweet notes left its throat. 'Look!' it seemed to be saying. 'The sun is shining! A soft wind is blowing! The children are playing outside!' A robin's mind was simple, beautifully so.

Satisfied that it had conveyed what information it had the robin spread out its wings, launching itself off the windowsill, flying up and up and up until it was no longer seen. It wasn't missed. It was never missed, not when there were more important things to worry about.

Inside the room, Sanada was torn. Should he punish Marui by making him run a thousand or so laps around the outer courtyard of the capitol, or should he instead simply give him a slap on the face? The latter of his two choices was simpler and would be completed in less time, but the former was better at ingraining the fact that what he had done was unforgiveable and terribly reckless. There was no doubt that Marui needed to be punished; rules set down by Yukimura were always followed. If only Sanada could settle on which type of punishment. Ah, decisions, decisions…

"I didn't think Marui was that reckless," Yanagi said placidly from where he sat next to the debating Sanada. The two of them were in one of the rooms of the infirmary wing, sitting on chairs next to the bed, in which Marui was dozing, sleeping off the strain of his earlier escapade. "He's usually so careful about things that could hurt him, even though you can't call him overly cautious. Using Aemis like that was rather unlike his character."

Sanada sighed, shaking his head, watching quietly as Yanagi got up and placed a hand on Marui's forehead. "His fever's gone down," the mage remarked as he sat back down in his chair and picked up his book, although he did not open it to read.

Marui shifted in the bed but did not waken, and neither of his two watchers liked how pale he was. Almost absentmindedly, Sanada brought the blanket further up, tucking Marui beneath the warm folds. "He was hit harder this time," Sanada said. "Usually all he needs to do is nap for a few hours." This time though, Marui had been out for the better part of the day, including the evening before, developing his fever just an hour after one of the healers had put him in a bed.

Yanagi nodded quietly, tucking the book away, as if realizing that he wouldn't be able to read it for the time being. "This is the first time I've seen him spike such a high fever," he admitted, and when talking with Yanagi, there were not a lot of things that he could say were the first that he had ever seen or experienced. His closed eyes shifted over to a spot next to the bed, where Aemis stood, propped so that it leaned innocently against the wall. "I'm surprised that Yukimura didn't deem it necessary to confiscate the bow."

"He must have a reason," Sanada grumbled, giving the bow a heated glare. In all honesty, though, he was just as puzzled as Yanagi was about the fact that Marui got to keep his bow. Sanada knew how much Yukimura hated it when Marui used it. It was always evident in those blue-violet eyes of his, and the way the muscles on his face would harden, just slightly, whenever the subject was breached. Sanada would have said something more, but the faint creaking sound of the mattress redirected his attention to the bed's occupant, who had just woken up, eyes narrowed slightly as light flooded into his sight.

Lavender orbs blinked once, then again, as Marui tried to bring his world into focus now that he was closer to consciousness than he had been a few hours before. The last thing that he could remember was Aemis, warm and alive in his hand, and him firing an arrow at those demons…

He shot straight up in bed, nearly bending over double as his body protested to such treatment by sending jolting pains through him, to which he hissed furiously as he tried to will the pain away. On top of that, his head was throbbing just as painfully, and through the throbbing, his brain was piecing together bits of thoughts, thoughts that included Aemis and Yukimura and punishment for putting himself in danger (Yukimura was a very careful person who despised his underlings getting hurt in any way, shape, or form, although it was hard to tell unless you've known the man for a while) and demons and even his great-grandmother, who he had never met but according to his mother and the stories passed down was a lot like him, and of which he only knew her name.

_I'm delirious,_ he thought, registering somewhere in his mind that was not being muddled by all these confusing thoughts that he was ill; periodically he shivered, chilled to the bone although he knew that these days were still summer, that it was warm outside and in. _Either that or I'm going mad._ Neither thought was very comforting to Marui. How he wished his thoughts could slow down so that he could pick one and focus on it. But instead, they flew around his head, coming and going on the tail of the thought before it, a steady train of never-ending confusion.

Hands descended on his shoulders and he was pushed down, back into a lying position, his head cushioned against the fluffy pillow. The soft blankets were tugged so that they could be draped over his chest. "You shouldn't move," Yanagi said simply, when Marui turned his head to give a half-hearted glare at his restrainers. To the side, Sanada muttered a, "Tarundaro!" but said nothing else, opting instead to let Yanagi do the talking, which the mage did. "You still have a slight fever and your body hasn't fully recovered yet. It would be best if you didn't agitate it any more by adding in unnecessary movement." He pushed Marui back down when he tried to rise again, threatening, "Marui, I am not afraid to bind you to this bed if I absolutely need to."

Grumbling, Marui admitted defeat and snuggled into the warmth of the bed, shivering as he did so. He hated fevers. Actually, he hated being sick in general. It wasn't a good feeling…

The door to the room suddenly slid open and one of the healers poked her head inside. "Ah… Marui-sama, you're awake!" she said brightly, smiling cheerfully. "Would you like to eat something? You've missed three meals and it's difficult to recover without food in your body." Her attention shifted to Yanagi and Sanada. "And would you like some, too, Yanagi-sama and Sanada-sama? You skipped the midday meal in order to check up on Marui-sama."

Sanada turned to the healer, giving a curt nod of his head. "Something simple will do. Bring a sleeping tonic, too." Marui opened his mouth to protest but was silenced by a glare from Sanada while the healer left to go inform the kitchens. "The sooner you regain all your strength, the better," Sanada growled. With Niou gone on one of his many missions, the seven remaining worked harder to ensure that everything was covered efficiently. Lately, with news of that mysterious mage on the loose, Yukimura and Sanada were being more careful than usual.

Sanada would breathe easier if he knew that they were all in top shape.

Sighing, Marui surrendered to Sanada, as if he understood what troubled the man. "Sorry about that, Sanada," he mumbled, looking about ashamed as he could possibly get. "I forgot that this is our caution period." He fell silent, turning his head so that he could look out the window. He hated it when they weren't all in one place at the capitol. The atmosphere always got really heavy when any one of them was gone. Marui didn't like it, the way that it was like anything anyone said would make everyone jump.

"You guys missed lunch to sit here all afternoon?" Marui asked finally after a few long moments of silence. He didn't turn his face away from the window, but all the same, he could tell that Yanagi and Sanada shifted uncomfortably. "Did 'Mura need something to be done?" he asked, with an air about him that said that he expected as much.

Yanagi's gaze rested on Marui and he was slow in answering. It was an overlooked fact, but their Archery master was insightful, who knew as many of the little tricks and secrets that happened in Rikkai as Yukimura, Sanada, and himself. "It was finished," he said, voice smooth and face expressionless. "You shouldn't trouble yourself over it."

Marui's lavender eyes closed almost tiredly as he breathed out a long, slow breath. "I see," he said softly.

It was a stony silence that enveloped the three after that. Marui didn't say anything more, Yanagi didn't yield any more information, Sanada's lips were pressed together in a grim line as his brown eyes stared at his katana. His hands remembered its weight in them from a few hours ago. Heavy, like there were innumerable numbers of bricks tied to the blade. Weak… feeble, because Sanada couldn't stop his hands from shaking, no matter how many times he told himself to calm down, to aim and execute the cut, making a clean straight line…

_'Sanada.'_

_The addressed man had stopped walking down the hall, turning to see Yukimura standing not to far away from him, Yanagi positioned at his shoulder. He gave a polite nod of his head as greeting, although the briefest flicker of surprise passed through his eyes. He had never seen Yukimura with such a grim expression on his face. The katana rattled gently in its sheath by Sanada's side (he had just returned from a lesson with Kirihara, and his eyes narrowed slightly. There was blood on Yukimura's hands, washed and cleaned away, of course, but the presence of the blood wouldn't leave until much later._

_He bit back his questions and waited. Yukimura had a habit of answering all questions when he spoke, after all._

_Sanada was sorely disappointed, though, when Yukimura didn't go at all into the subject. Instead, he gestured for Sanada to draw his sword, which he did, albeit with puzzlement evident on his features._

_'I want you to cut Marui.'_

_Sanada had stared at Yukimura then, not understanding. 'I beg pardon?' he asked, wondering if perhaps the clang of swords was still affecting his hearing._

_'I want you to cut Marui with your sword,_'_ Yukimura had repeated, with limitless patience, sounding as if asking his second-in-command to deliberately hurt one of their own was a regular occurrence. Then, he had turned and strode away with a sweep of his robes, leaving a dumbstruck Sanada with a silent Yanagi, who simply placed a hand on Sanada's arm and gave him a little push towards the Infirmary._

_And Sanada had followed…_

_Such was the power that Yukimura exhibited over his subjects._

_***_

Marui had almost dozed off into another fitful slumber by the time the healer popped back in with a tray of food for three. Yanagi took it from her, murmuring a quick thanks as she shook Marui gently into wakefulness and let him sit up, slipping a few extra cushions behind him to help keep him from slipping down (much to his chagrin, which she ignored). She dropped a quick curtsy to the three, telling them that if they needed her she would be completing her rounds and then be in the adjacent courtyard. Sanada nodded to show that they understood and she left, shutting the door quietly behind her to give them some peace.

Yanagi pushed a bowl of broth and a few slices of bread spread thick with butter and jam towards Marui, who was trying to rearrange his rumpled robes to make himself appear a bit more presentable. The mage watched this with a hint of bemusement before telling him to let the robes be and eat before the food turned cold. Marui's answer was to make a childish face but obey. As for Sanada and Yanagi themselves, they only sipped a bit on their tea, occasionally stopping to nibble on a slice of plain bread each. Neither was very hungry.

"The wind is picking up," Marui suddenly remarked, popping the last bit of his bread into his mouth and licking the sticky jam from his fingers. He looked surprised and amused when Yanagi's head snapped up and his hands nearly dropped the teacup he was holding, which would have upended a good deal of hot tea onto his lap.

It would have left a nice stain on that cream-colored silk. A pity, a pity…

"What?" Marui asked innocently, fighting to keep the grin from his face as he imagined Yanagi with his robes stained with tea. For some reason, it made for an amusing image in his mind, seeing the usually careful and meticulous Yanagi be careless enough to spill tea on himself. "Can't you hear it? The sound just got louder and it's tearing a little harder at the leaves. It's a north wind; I suspect it'll be colder tonight than usual…" Marui finished his comment about the wind, tilting his head lightly to one side. "Funny how I never noticed anything about the wind before," he mused, looking mildly curious.

Yanagi set down his cup, studying Marui who was happily finishing the rest of his broth, looking like he had not a single care in the world. His eyes opened, revealing sharp brown orbs that no one knew existed since he kept them hidden so much. Now those brown depths shifted, pinning Sanada with their sharp gaze. The swordsmaster could only shake his head, and Yanagi returned his attention to Marui, thinking, pondering. Was this supposed to happen, and this fast, he wondered, a light frown gracing his features. And was Marui even fully aware of his new state?

_Probably not,_ Yanagi decided, watching quietly from the side as Marui tried to strike up a conversation with Sanada, who suddenly looked… uncomfortable. It wasn't entirely a surprise; Yanagi should have expected as much. Sanada didn't particularly like enchantments and the like, clinging instead to the things he could fully hold within his hands.

Things like his sword, for example.

Yanagi studied his hands, shifting his fingers, remembering the heat, the tingling sensation of the power that the spell unlocked. He hadn't known such a spell had existed, hadn't even known the power of this new branch of magic that he had just scratched the surface of, and he was one of the strongest… one of the ones with the most knowledge…

_'This ward,' Yanagi murmured, holding his hand over the blade of Sanada's proffered sword and letting his power flow from flesh to steel, 'will prevent any physical harm from happening to him. There will be no scar when this is finished and he will feel no pain. It will allow the sword to cut straight to the part of Marui's body that we actually need.' He removed his hand and opened the door to Marui's Infirmary room, stepping inside, Sanada following after a moment of hesitation._

_'We'll need a clean cut from shoulder to hip, I'm assuming?' Sanada had asked, standing at the foot of the bed, looking down on the sleeping young man, cheeks flushed red with fever._

_'Yes,' Yanagi had agreed, pulling out a sparkling silver orb. 'It needs to be done quickly, before his body can reject the extra power.' He removed the blankets, carefully undoing the robe so that it exposed a bare chest and smooth, flawless skin. His finger traced a line from Marui's right shoulder and across towards the left hip, leaving behind a faint glow as a guideline. 'Go along this line,' he instructed. 'The cut will heal by itself when the orb is placed.'_

_Sanada was not entirely sure about that, but Yanagi had more knowledge than him in spells, so he had obeyed, eyeing the line, lifting his sword, hardening his resolve (it was almost surprising to consider that, underneath his harsh exterior, Sanada cared very much about his fellow Rikkai members, especially where their health was concerned)._

_Marui shifted in his sleep, letting out a faint mew of discontent, shivering, chilled with the loss of both blanket and robe. When he had stilled, Sanada slashed down, quick and accurate, upon the line Yanagi had left him._

_There was no blood; no cry of indignant pain that Sanada had been sure would come. For the cut was shallow and long, and had it been a move on the battlefield, would have achieved nothing more than possibly making the enemy die a slow miserable death due to loss of blood. In place of the blood, the cut oozed a different substance, ethereal wisps of something akin to mist. It was gone almost as soon as it appeared; Yanagi slid the orb into the incision and Sanada could only watch as the skin rushed to close itself. When it was done, it was like nothing had ever happened to the sleeping man..._

_Nothing at all…_

* * *

_One should not believe so heavily in omens, because if he did, he would be seeing them everywhere. All around you are signs to tell you what is happening and what is to come. All you need to do is open your eyes and look. But the eyes are blind, and one must look with the heart, with the soul. Let that guide you._

* * *

A/N: I failz. Why does it seem like the more I write, the more 'ugh' my work seems to get? Why? *sighs* Maybe I'm over-complicating things.

And is it just me, or is there a lot of food involved in this chapter? Hmm...

It took me an insanely long time to figure out that a score means 20. And now that I know what it means, using it makes me feel smart. Yes, I am pathetic.

Leave a **review**? Please? *puppy dog eyes*


	6. Niou: Part I

**_Chapter 5 – Niou: Part I_**

There was a child, once. He was a little scrap of a thing… with silver hair that was soft despite its spikes which made it look fluffy and blue eyes that always seemed to have the faintest sparkle in them. He would always try to act tough, even when he was frightened, even when he was hurt. He had a mother and a father, the former who was kind despite having seen the hardships of living on the frontier after being raised in a privileged household in the more sophisticated city and the latter seldom home, busy at his work duties, whatever those were. He had an older sister who took it upon herself to 'educate' him with her knowledge of the world (though it was quite limited when compared to their mother's, who was also a much better teacher in his opinion). He had a younger brother who liked to act childish but had the wonderfully adorable quality of wanting to please everyone he met, make them smile, make them laugh.

Once, that boy got into an accident. He was thrown off of a horse, which had spooked when the child next door had startled a few chickens so that they went squawking into the air, landing awkwardly on his arm upon landing on the ground. Miraculously, the break was a clean one, so healing came relatively easily after the arm was placed in a splint and the doctor gave his mother stern warnings on making sure that he didn't prod the arm should he get impatient with its slow healing process. During this time, he immersed himself with mastering the difficulties of every-day activities with his good arm, picking up on how to do household chores since he was made to stay home when before he was let out to play. In the evening, his mother would sit down at the creaking rocking chair by the fire, gathering her flock to her as she sang of the deeds of the heroes of old, always picking his favorite ones to tell.

Sometimes during those storytelling sessions, he wondered if it would be worth it to break another arm, but would soon quickly discard the idea. It had been plenty painful the first time until the doctor had fed him full of a sleeping tonic, to which he did not waken until noon of the next day, his arm already in the splint and the acute pain moving to a dull throbbing ache.

He didn't like pain, no matter how mild or sharp it was.

He also didn't like it when his father was home. He was a _good_ father, making enough to ensure that there was always food on the table, and he must have been a good person for his mother to fall in love with, he reasoned, but he did not like the man. Perhaps it was because his father never tried to spend as much as his time at home as all the other fathers. He'd be out for days at a time, returning often worse for wear. And though he always left his travelling clothes outside where the children could not immediately find them, the boy had seen those clothes, stained with mud and more often than not blood. He had sensed that there was something amiss relatively quickly, and he did not like it when secrets were kept from him, whether it was from his father or anyone else.

He was always tired, worn, his father, but with blue eyes that stared at the world and dared them to ask him if there was something that he had not seen, had not known. His father was regal, carrying himself with a humble sort of pride that he had tried to mimic when he was very little, only to give up when it became evident that he could not recreate the quiet, confident footsteps or the easy, loping gait.

He was perfect. Secretly, his eldest son wanted to be just like him, and was faintly disgusted and disgruntled at the fact that he wasn't, that he _couldn't_, no matter how hard he tried.

His mother had shook her head, pulled him to her side, stroking his hair, telling him that he was silly for trying to model after his father. But it was a boy's dream to be just like his father, and he clung stubbornly to that dream. All his mother could do was try to mend as much of the wounded pride as she could and cheer him on from the sidelines. She was exceptionally good at both of those tasks.

There was a boy, once, who stood in the middle of the street of his devastated village, staring wide-eyed at the carnage all around him. His face was pale, gaunt, cheeks sucked in dangerously, although whether from shock or fear or hunger it was unclear. He was empty… so, so empty, those once-bright blue eyes dull with a mix of horror, terror, sorrow, fear.

Through the smoke that rose from the burned houses he could see their faces. His mother's, beautiful and so full of life, was instead a sickly pale. Dark circles ringed her eyes, sweat matted her bangs to her forehead, chapped lips begged for water. His sister's and brother's faces he could see, too, looking very similar, though they were half covered by the blanket from where they were curled up next to their mother.

"Run…" his mother had rasped out, before all this destruction had taken place, when there had been a lapse in her fever-ridden delirium and she was looking at him with clear eyes from the makeshift bed he and his father had erected for their ill family members. "Leave us," she commanded, trying to be as stern as she could in her current state. "My sweet boy…" she whispered, smiling slightly, before her hand fell from his and she was silent, while he, not comprehending, ran to fetch a cup of water. He held it up to her lips, missing the faint trembling of his hands and the fact that she had failed to draw breath for the past few minutes.

It had taken him nearly twenty minutes to realize that she was dead. A quick inspection of his siblings yielded the same result, and he had stumbled backwards, reeling, back hitting the doorframe, staring almost accusingly at the three bodies in the bed, almost as if in sleep. But his mother had spoken, and his mother's word was law. Spinning on his heel, he had ran.

The destruction of his village had already started. He could see the flashing of the steel weapons; they shone and danced like fireflies, until the cobbled streets were red with blood accompanied by the ever-lingering screams. He was going to throw up, the sharp iron scent of the blood thick in his mouth and all he wanted was to be away from there, away from the horror, the smoke, somewhere safe where he could breathe clean sweet air and have his mother close by.

And then he was looking up, looking into the face of a man who looked bored, as if running a blade through people was a trivial matter that he performed on a daily basis. The man looked at him, sizing him up as if he were a hunk of meat on sale in the market. He looked up at the man, too startled to move.

The man's lips twitched up into a smirk. "Brat looks just like his father," he commented, as if he was speaking to someone else even though there was no one with him. "I don't know whether or not that annoys me or amuses me." Something about that smirk unsettled the boy and he began to inch backward, slowly, slowly.

"You must be mistaken, brat," the man drawled out, causing him to stop in his movements and stare warily up at him. "We have no need for the weak. Consequently, the weak give rise to the pathetic, and the world will be better without them as well." There was a movement of his arm, so quick that the boy's eyes could not follow them, even though he had a gift of being able to track fast-moving objects that others would miss, and then an explosion of white-hot pain in his chest. It was ten times worse, no, one hundred, perhaps even one thousand times worse then when he had broken his arm.

"Those who are useless will be erased from the world. Such is the fate of the weak and the pathetic. Vanish, and be no more." He slipped back through the haze of smoke, vanishing from sight, leaving the child quivering on the ground, a fine slash of crimson red on his torso that leaked the his blood onto the ground.

He woke up in a bed, tucked snugly under soft covers, a damp cloth on his forehead. There was a dull ache from his chest that intensified as he pushed himself gingerly into a sitting position. Looking down he could see that his chest was expertly bandaged; it must have been recently as the bandages were still fresh.

Something poked his shoulder gently and he flinched, shying away from the touch before looking over his shoulder. A pair of curious blue-violet eyes stared at him from underneath wavy dark-blue hair. For a while the two just stared at each other before the other smiled cheerily, holding out his hand. "Hello!" he chirped. "I was beginning to think you'd never wake up! Isn't it boring to sleep for three days? It was boring sitting here watching you, but Father said that someone needed to because it wasn't safe to leave injured people unattended and I wanted to finish my book without anyone interrupting me."

He blinked, slowly processing this through his sleep- and pain-fogged mind. Three days… he had been sleeping for three days. "Where am I?" he ventured forth, studying the other boy warily. He was his age, but he could tell immediately that he wasn't from the same class as him. His clothes, for one reason. Under the lighting of the sunlight that streamed in from the window, they seemed to shine. Silk, he thought, because his mother had a silk dress that was the prettiest thing he had ever laid eyes on. How did he get here, in this place that he was unfamiliar with, with this boy who was obviously much better off than he was?

"You're in the capitol!" was the bright and cheery answer. "Father brought you home and you've been sleeping since then. What village are you from? I know almost all of the boys my age in the surrounding villages but this is the first time I've ever met you before." He held out his hand. "My name is Seiichi. Yukimura Seiichi. What's yours?" He looked expectantly at him.

He whispered his name, so softly that even he himself could barely hear and understand. Obviously, Seiichi didn't understand, because he cocked his head lightly to one side with a curiously puzzled expression on his face. But before he could ask for him to repeat it someone was at the doorway, softly calling out "Seiichi, leave him alone so he can rest."

Seiichi gave him another curious look before murmuring a, "Yes, Father," and slipping away from the side of the bed, trotting over to his father. There was a soft click of the door and then the room was silent, but not before he heard him ask, "Father, why won't he say his name? Does he not have one?"

He hunched his shoulders, leaning forward over his blanketed lap. At first he was silent and still, but gradually, his shoulders began to move as he tried to suppress sobs. Of course he had a name… everyone had a name. He was…

"Niou," he whispered hoarsely, passing the back of his hand quickly across his eyes to wipe away any remaining tears. "Niou. I am Niou Masaharu."

***

Yukimura looked up from the book he was reading when a sharp rap sounded on the door. That could only be Sanada… only the stern swordsmaster had that brisk, three-rap knock that he had come to know so well. "Come in," he called out, smiling as the door slid open to reveal just who he thought it would be, balancing a tray of tea in one hand. "Afternoon tea?" Yukimura asked, eying the tray in the swordsman's large hands with unmasked appreciation. "Your timing is impeccable as always, Sanada. How on earth do you do it?"

Sanada gave him a curious glance as he set the tray down on the table and let Yukimura pour out two cups of the steaming amber liquid. "Your schedule is rather concrete," he supplied. "You always want tea two hours after the noon meal." Sanada had long since memorized the little quirks in Yukimura's personality and knew the young leader's schedule like the back of his own hand.

Yukimura chuckled, blowing gently on his tea to cool it and then taking a sip. "You know me too well, Sanada," he said lightly, savoring the taste while Sanada sat down opposite him and took the proffered cup. "I guess that is to be expected, though. We grew up together, after all."

"Hn," Sanada murmured. "Yes, I remember." They had been good friends since their childhood days. Sanada's father was Yukimura's father's right-hand man, a swordsmaster who passed down his incredible skills to his son as well as heaping books upon books onto the little Sanada. Power came not only from physical strength, he liked to say, but from one's knowledge of the world. He liked to bring forth this saying whenever Sanada had complained about how reading the books in the library were much more _boring_ than honing his swordsmanship in the dojo, or simply running and reveling in the simple boyish wonder of it.

A quick glance at the Sanada and Yukimura in their childhood days would have yielded polar opposites. Sanada was the child who would not, _could_ not, stop moving. He was rarely still, preferring to run and jump and fight than to relax with a book in hand. Yukimura preferred to read, shutting himself in the library constantly, where his eyes would sparkle as he prowled through the shelves and shelves of books to pick an adventure for himself. Sanada was much louder than the soft-spoken Yukimura, prone to acting rashly, intent on being the strongest of the strong; the best of the best. Yukimura, at that time, was satisfied as long as he was amused, a requirement that books easily fulfilled by transporting him to the lands of the legends, where princes rescued their princesses and where mages always figured out a way to help everyone with their skills, where all the characters could be labeled as 'good' or 'evil' and where good always trounced evil. The two had seemed to be so different from each other that it puzzled the adults at how they had managed to settle down and hold a decent conversation, much less become _friends_.

"And what book is that?" Sanada asked, gesturing to the large tome that lay open on the table, pushed to the side to make way for the tray. It was an older work; Sanada could see that some parts of the edge of the pages were yellowed and beginning to crumble, if just by a tiny bit, which was impressive considering the great amount of care that Yukimura put into his books. His love of children was only surpassed by his love of books, and if so much as a single page of a book was mistreated in any manner, Yukimura was in no way hesitant about letting his wrath out on the unfortunate person who happened to abuse the page.

"This?" Yukimura asked, placing his hand on the tome. "I was browsing through the old records and found it. It was a book where Father recorded all he knew about each person who wasn't born in the capitol, such as those who came here because of incidences in their home villages. I always wondered where he kept them when I was a child."

Sanada let out another 'Hn,' setting down his cup. "And now you're simply browsing through them?" he asked, not entirely believing that his superior would do such a thing on a whim. He would act like it, but there was always some reason behind his every action. Sanada found it fascinating, to a certain degree.

"No. I've been meaning to do so for quite some time except it's been rather… busy, lately," Yukimura murmured, almost absentmindedly. "Shadow Demons among us, Zephyr, Marui, Niou, Hiro… it hasn't been exactly peaceful in the past few days."

Sanada arched an eyebrow. "So you're worried," he stated.

Yukimura almost burst out laughing, looking more than amused. "Sanada, what heartless person do you take me for?" he asked, stifling a few giggles as he spoke. "Of course I worry. I always worry. I'm like you, Sanada; I like seeing all of my people around me instead of in the far-flung corners of Rikkai." He turned to the tome, giving it his full attention. "Actually, it was marvelous that you stepped in when you did. I thought you'd have liked to read this." Taking the huge book, he slid it over to Sanada, slim finger lightly tapping a certain section of the page. "This excerpt, please. I think you'll find it rather surprising."

Sanada glanced at Yukimura before directing his attention to the indicated passage. _'The Pillar of Strength,'_ it read, and intrigued about how it could connect with someone in their very own capitol, Sanada read on.

_'It is said that the Pillar of Strength was created long ago, by the early inhabitants of world. At that time, there were no regions, no Rikkai, no Seigaku, no Hyoutei. People were one and the same. The Pillar of Strength went up with its sister pillars, the Pillar of Resolution and the Pillar of Will, located in what is now Seigaku and Hyoutei, respectively, although no one knows if they are indeed pillars or if the word pillar is simply used to describe something that is entirely different._

_'However, whether or not these three Pillars are actually pillars, it is agreed by all mages and historians in all three lands that each of the three harbors such a vast amount of power that it would be disastrous if they were not protected. Thus the three high families came to be, lineages of mages trained specifically to guard these three treasures, one for each land. Only the members of the high families have seen the Pillars in their fully exposed state. From the scant information I was able to gather on the high families, it seems that the eldest son is trained at a young age in order to strengthen his body so that he can withstand high levels of magic at all time. Not much is known about the exact training or age, or what kind of magic exactly one must be trained for; the high families do not keep records on this and the tradition is passed down only from father to son._

_'I have a few assumptions about the high family of Rikkai. There is a village located on the outskirts of the central lands, as close to the Forbidden lands as possible, as the power from the Pillar radiates outward and the closer one gets to the Pillar the harder it is to handle the sheer amounts of magical power. However, I've heard mentions of a man in the village who ventures towards the heart of the central lands every day, and I have thus formulated a hypothesis that this man may be able to withstand the vast amounts of power because he is a member of the high family.'_

Yukimura's finger suddenly appeared in Sanada's vision, pointing at another passage a bit further down the page. "Read here now," he prompted, and Sanada had no choice but to read where Yukimura directed him.

_'When I arrived at the village and asked around, I discovered that there was indeed a man who travelled daily into the central lands. His name: Niou Susuke-san, with a wife and three children. I was cordially invited into his home before he left for the day, where Niou-san revealed that, yes, his family was the high family. He was wary to disclose any more information, but I did not press. Knowing that Rikkai still has a high family that diligently works despite the fact that few know about them greatly comforts me. And I am sure that I am not alone in that assumption. Seigaku's Tezuka Kuniharu and Hyoutei's Atobe Keisuke were also interested in their respective high families, from what I've learned from the last time that I've met with them. That was when Seiichi was still a baby; isn't it amazing that the high families can remain hidden under our noses for eight long years so easily? Such impressive families they are, indeed. _

_'It was not until I returned to the capitol and a few months had passed when I received a rather urgent message from Niou-san, requesting that I come immediately to his village. Of course, my advisors protested to this, but I am sure that, had they known who was requesting this, they would have agreed and let me go without a fuss._

_'Upon my arrival, I was surprised when Niou-san handed me a parcel with an envelope, instructing me to open the envelope and read it only when I returned to the capitol. As if that wasn't enough of a matter for me to wrap my mind around, he instructed that I was to take his son with me when I returned to the capitol, the sooner the better, and teach him about his duty as a part of the high family. Naturally, I was puzzled, asking him why he felt the need for me to do something that he was supposed to do. His answer: 'poison.'_

_'It was only later that I learned that Niou-san's family had been poisoned, his eldest son being the only one not affected as he had started his training shortly before the incident. Apparently, one of the first tasks one learns is immunity to poisons, as being exposed to vast quantities of magic is toxic to the body and so the natural defenses must be strengthened through additional training. Niou-san suspected that the perpetuators would be entering the village shortly and in an effort to protect as many of the villagers as he could, he would engage them directly while sending his heir off to be raised so that he could continue the lineage. A dangerous venture, he explained to me, as he had already analyzed them to the best of his ability and had been, for lack of better word, stunned at the sheer amount of power the small attack force of mages had possessed. 'Surely, Yukimura-dono,' he had said to me, 'you know more about us than you let on. There is a reason only one family can do such a job, and I must ensure that we continue on. Take my Masaharu and raise him within the capitol. I have transferred the bulk of my power to him and as long as he lives my family has served its purpose and shall continue to do so._

_'Since then, I have taken in Niou Masaharu as asked of me, transferring him to the capitol where hopefully, my own Seiichi will help him to grow into a regular child and, as all young boys are prone to do, into a fine young man. I've burned the contents of the letter, as it has instructed me to do, so I shall not discuss it, but I shall close with this phrase, in hopes that someday when Seiichi is old enough to read and understand my entries, he will pass this on to Niou when I myself cannot:_

_'Bathe the earth with a light shadow; paint the sky with __achromatic __colors, until you have introduced a beautiful illusion to the people with what you believe and what you can accomplish.'_

Shutting the tome when he was finished, Sanada turned to Yukimura, a puzzled expression in his brown eyes, eyes that Yukimura always felt were much too… honest. Everything that Sanada felt, everything that he thought, it was always reflected in his eyes, no matter what the situation. There weren't a lot of brutally honest people in the world; Yukimura felt glad that he knew one of the few. "Yukimura-dono was a master at hiding things," Sanada finally said, and Yukimura smiled. Both men remembered vividly the games the previous leader had made them play, hiding candy all over the place and setting the two boys to find them whenever he needed some peace. It would occupy them for hours, and at suppertime neither would want to eat, having gorged themselves on candy right before. When Niou joined them, introduced by Yukimura to Sanada shortly after the healers had deemed him well enough to leave his bed and play, he had been their mastermind at finding the hidden treats.

"True. I wouldn't have known anything about this had Father not sent me a letter instructing me to do so," Yukimura replied lightly. His father, upon giving up his position as head of Rikkai once Yukimura had passed his eighteenth birthday, had retired to the Yukimura family estate, which had been in the family for generations past and generations to come. Occasionally, when things weren't too busy, Yukimura would set aside a day or two and go out to visit him and his mother's grave, leaving Sanada in charge for the time that he was gone. It was such visit that the elder Yukimura had drawn the younger one to a side, handing him an envelope.

_'There is a particular record that you're old enough to read,'_ he had instructed him, when he had accepted the letter, running a finger over the familiar soft loops of the elegant handwriting that his father possessed. _'It is free for you to interpret however you feel is right, but I caution you, Seiichi, this is not a decision that you can make with only your head, as you are so fond of.'_

Here, he had poked his son gently in the chest, looking serious. _'I want you to use the power that you locked up to come up with a plan of action. Do not think that every problem has a rational solution. Some matters must be approached by options that do not require logic.'_

"Even with the written instructions, it was still a hassle to find," Yukimura finished softly, lacing his fingers together in deep thought.

Sanada listened quietly, as he always did when Yukimura spoke. But this time, his expression hardened, and something akin to disappointment flashed through his eyes. "Yukimura," he said suddenly, and Yukimura paused, tilting his head curiously to the side. "What else are you hiding from me?"

There was a pause where Yukimura seemed to be carefully choosing his words. "When you're ready, I'll be more than willing to tell you everything that I've been withholding from you," he finally said. Giving the window a brief glance, judging the position of the sun, he brought the tome back in front of him. "Look at the time; I hope you're not planning on making Kirihara-kun practice sparring even when the sun goes down," he said lightly, as he had not just let Sanada read about the not-so happy history of one of their own, or that Sanada had not just accused him of not being entirely truthful in all of his actions.

Taking his cue to leave, Sanada rose, collecting the tea items. Giving a small bow of his head, he swept out of the room, shutting the door quietly after him, conscious that Yukimura's blue-violet eyes were following his every movement. It was almost like an eagle keeping its eye on its prey and would-be meal. When Sanada was gone, the young leader of Rikkai rested his hand gently on the worn cover of the tome.

"Ne, Sanada… if I told you that almost everything you know about me was a lie, what would you do?" he murmured softly, attention focused on the book. "Would you look at me with that hurt puppy look, or would you be like when we were younger, and be quick to anger?"

Of course, when Sanada found just exactly why Yukimura had wanted him and Yanagi to perform the strange Marui operation, Yukimura also suspected quite a display of fireworks. Combined with the ones that he suspected he would see with the unveiling of his own powers, it would be quite a formidable display of rage. Sanada was the kind of person who liked it when everything he needed to know was laid out neatly in front of him, after all. The swordsmaster absolutely hated it when the facts were hidden but seemed to be right in front of him, hidden behind sweet smiles and bright eyes. Hated it…

_Do you hate me, Sanada?_

***

The little glass vial clinked softly as it fell onto the table, dumped out from a small pouch. Its contents shifted within the vial, and before it was allowed to settle it was picked up, held up in the air and studied quietly. "Taken right from him?" asked a soft voice, as the vial was turned so that it could be studied from all sides. "You've certainly grown; for a moment, I was afraid you wouldn't hesitate to kill him right on the spot." Of course, Yagyuu used the term 'afraid' very loosely.

The owner of the pouch let out a small, disgruntled snort as he pocketed the item within his cloak. "My Lord's orders cannot be disobeyed lightly and on a whim," he answered. "If my Lord permits me to say… I would rather put my pride aside for a short while than face my Lord's wrath."

An amused chuckle answered this. "Really? Am I really that frightening?" The vial disappeared, tucked safely away into some pocket or another. "But, no matter how one looks at, maintaining a relationship of intense dislike with someone is natural in this world. In order to love there must first be hate. It's a rather natural balance."

His follower in the shadows shifted nervously, wondering if saying such a thing was considered… normal. "My Lord, you have not told me why you desired that small vial from the assassin."

This caught the other's attention, and he found himself cowering slightly before the serious gaze that only those sharp gold eyes behind delicate glasses could accomplish. "Why? I planned on using it, of course. I was careless enough to let the last of my supply go all those years ago, so one can naturally be aware of my excitement to know that some of this poison still exists. It was difficult to obtain, and I don't plan on letting a single drop get wasted."

He stood up, stepping forward, motioning with an elegant wave of his hand for his follower to leave the shadows. His subordinate obeyed. "Tell me, Zacharias, if someone destroyed your family with poison, and you got your hands on a sample of that same substance, what would you do with it? Answer me truthfully, though I suspect that most people would have the same answer."

"My Lord, I would use it against them at the first chance I got, so they can have a taste of what my family went through."

"See? A perfect example of how hate exists in the world," Yagyuu said silkily. "I would suspect that our dear assassin had something more or less like that in his mind. It works out to be to our advantage." He rested his hand on Zacharias's head, almost as if in a friendly or fatherly manner. "Your family… it is just as skilled and as qualified for the position as Niou's family is. Yet, it was the Nious who became the high family, while yours was overlooked. Cast aside, if you will, doomed to be in the shadow of the Niou family."

His voice lowered into a purr. "For the honor of your family and your own pride, you want to destroy them and take their role, am I right?" He received a nod as an answer, one that was slightly hesitant, like a child who was given permission to eat a treat or play with a certain toy but wasn't exactly sure that he could. "I still stand fast behind what I promised you that time we first met. Do you remember what I told you? I said that I would let you take the position Rikkai's high family when I was through with what I wanted to do with our dear little assassin. As long as you follow me diligently…"

Here, his hand shifted from the other's head to trace along the line of his jaw. A satisfied smile spread across his lips. "But that shouldn't be much of a problem, should it? After all, you are indebted to me, and your family lives by a strict honor code that until a debt is paid, no harm can be done to the person who helped you."

Feeling brave, Zacharias piped up, "Are you suggesting that you are exploiting that particular trait of my family?"

Yagyuu's mouth lifted into a smirk, as if the question poised to him was the most amusing thing he had heard in a long while. "Perhaps. Interpret it as you will, but I operate with only your best interest in mind."

Turning from Zacharias, he summoned Haru to him, the shadow demon scampering up to his shoulder where it perched, alert and watchful as always. "I have planning to do. You are free to do as you please, although I expect you to be here by nightfall with all of your demons present. I will have a task for you then, and we will be one step closer to placing your family in the position of high family." He gave a vague gesture with his hand, saying, "Leave, now." Zacharias bowed low, retreating back into the shadows and then leaving the room.

When he was gone, Yagyuu slipped his hand into his pocket, fingering the small vial lovingly. "He's immune to it, of course," he said offhandedly. But that was alright; he had a different poison prepared just for the little assassin. "No matter, when tools are finished, they are no longer useful. And what is the fate of useless items?"

Haru purred, liking where this train of thought was going. _'They are erased, Master, until they are no more.'_

The fool. Yagyuu only worked for one person's interest, and one person's only.

He only worked for himself.

* * *

_Those words of honey soothe you, but they are the fangs of a viper. Sooner or later, they will turn on you and bite, sinking quickly, injecting their poison and then leaving you for dead. The person who is in front of you, who always smiles so sweetly and acts innocently, in reality he harbors as dark a past as yourself, with scars just like yours. Do not think that you understand what you can just see on the surface, what you just here at one given time._

* * *

A/N: Yay! Update after forever! So now I shall swamp you with the wall of text. :)

I feel kind of sorry for Niou. I wonder why I so enjoy torturing all of these poor characters? Perhaps I am an inner sadist. XP

Leave a review? I would love that very much. Click the green review button to have tea with Yukimura!


	7. Niou: Part II

**_Notes: _**death of innocent little animals where Yagyuu decides to show his cruel side. Some language (like... a word or two, I believe). I don't think it's_ too_ horrifically graphic (yet), but do take caution when reading if you're the really sensitive kind (although I've seen worse... just warning you).

* * *

**_Chapter 6 – Niou: Part II_**

The wound on the little boy's chest took several weeks to heal, and even after the skin had closed, leaving a jagged line of a scar where it had been to last for the rest of his life, it took months for Niou to be able to function properly like the child he was. Learning to walk when he was finally released from the cruel fate of remaining in bed was an arduous task, with him having to slowly learn how to best coordinate his body to minimize the pain that still seized him roughly at the worst of times. Walking evolved into an ungainly hop-skip type of running, which slowly turned into a more natural and graceful run. After pushing himself, it came to the point where he could finally run like he used to, and it became a fun sport for him to run around in the central courtyard. Sometimes, Yukimura's father would catch a small hint of a smile on his face when he was running, and the man couldn't help but smile himself at those times. It was a slow process, the healing of Niou Masaharu, but the elder Yukimura knew that things would work out. He was the son of the high family, and even though he was shy, quiet, drifting along after Yukimura and Sanada, almost like a ghost, there was a small flicker of life about him that had been missing weeks before. Blue eyes peeked out from underneath white bangs, studying everything around him with something that was a lot like suspicion, but from where he spied on the boys from behind a window, he watched as that closely guarded look slowly was lowered, day after day.

It was sometime during Niou's recovery that Yanagi came to the capital and was assimilated into the little group that consisted of the young Yukimura, Sanada, and Niou. Yanagi's father was a mage who had, unfortunately, perished at roughly the same time Niou's own father did, although the exact causes were unknown. Yanagi did not like the topic, and consequently did not ever speak of it. Yukimura hypothesized that the only one who would possibly have known was his father, and didn't pry, although it was obvious that he was not just a bit curious about the nature of how the very mature boy came about. Likewise, although Sanada and Niou expressed varying degrees of interest on the same subject, they did not pry into Yanagi's past, and simply included him in their games and strove hard to have as much fun as they could in said games. It was within the simple complexity of childhood games that they forged their friendships, one that was based on each other's dependence on the other and subsequently grew stronger the longer they were together.

Then came along a little Marui, lost and afraid, staring at the other boys with evident fear in his big lavender eyes, huddled behind Yukimura's father and only offering short, one-syllable answers to any and all questions besides the one asking for his name. He dragged a huge package along behind him; it was easily twice his size and so heavy that he half-carried it, half-dragged it, leaving a small trail in the dust of the road from the movement. Marui was assigned to the same dormitory as Niou and Yanagi, and it did not take long for the other two to figure out that Marui was deathly afraid of the dark, whimpering, tossing and turning, searching for his mother that all three boys knew would not come for him. If she would, then Yukimura's father certainly wouldn't have led him to the capital himself.

Niou constructed a fort for the three of them in the dorms, he and Yanagi pushing their beds against Marui's until it formed one big one. 'Borrowing' a few extra quits that weren't in use, they rolled them up and anchored them at the ends of the bed, forming primitive if not childishly pleasing walls. A sheet borrowed from the storeroom was their roof, and all three huddled underneath, amusing themselves during the dark hours of the night with stories and little word games (which Yanagi proved to be a master at) until they fell asleep, curled together until they were a mess of tangled blankets and limbs from when one boy flung out his arm or kicked in his sleep. While it served its main purpose, taking Marui's mind off of the things that the boy could not change, it relieved the other two as well, who had nearly the same fears and uncertainties, which rose like monsters and threatened to engulf them when the sun went down and there was little to distract them.

A year passed in this manner, and Marui grew out of his fear of the dark, although every once in a while they still revived the fort and did their tradition of storytelling and word games, just for the fun of it. Occasionally they'd infiltrate the other dormitory where Yukimura and Sanada were and drag them over to theirs, having a five-person fort, much to the chagrin of Sanada, who very much liked his sleep and did not appreciate being jabbed awake every once in a while by a poke in the ribs. Yukimura enjoyed these late-night events, though, and was often more than happy to contribute any elaborate legends or stories that he had read from the library. Niou amused all with his ability to spice up the words, Yanagi impressed with coming up with big synonyms for common words, and Marui and Sanada proved to be adept at plot development when given the chance. The five were the bane of the children dormitory assistant's existence, and they (the dormitory assistants, that was) were quite thrilled when the boys grew out of their dorms and moved to the apprentice dorms and a new set of assistants.

No more than a week after they had been moved to the apprentice dorm and with the apprenticing ceremony looming up in just a few short weeks, Yukimura asked, "Niou-kun, what do you want to be?"

Niou looked up from where he was constructing the plans for his latest prank, a quizzical expression on his face while the stick that he held in one hand slowed in its frenzied scratching in the dirt. "What do you mean, Mura?" he asked. Truth be told, he had never given it much thought. The two boys were in the central courtyard, which was surprisingly empty, given the fact that normally there would be plenty of children running around to play in the warm afternoon sun, or to splash in the cold water of the fountain. But today it was only Yukimura and Niou and a few busy ants in the middle of dragging choice crumbs to their nest in a secluded corner of the courtyard.

Yukimura smiled, looking amused. "When you're to be apprenticed," he said again, "what faction would you like to be apprenticed to? Do you want to be a mage? Or a warrior? Or maybe you want to be a healer?" They didn't get to pick what they wanted to be apprenticed to, but they could always dream. Yukimura's father and his advisors would judge where everyone's strengths laid and then divide them accordingly. That was the way jobs in Rikkai were organized. Leadership was always passed on from father to son, although the son would still be apprenticed to a faction and take supplementary lessons in preparation for succession.

His blue-violet eyes shown brightly as he shifted his attention from Niou and to the sky, leaning backwards with his hands on the edge of the stone fountain. "I want to be a great mage, just like my father! I want to be able to rule Rikkai just as well as him!" He paused to consider his words, shaking his head gently from side to side. "No, that's not it. I want to be an even better ruler than him. I want to surpass him." This was a time in each boy's life where he was allowed to dream big, to speculate a life where he achieved great things, grand things, modeled after the hero that all little boys shared: their father. This was a time before the horror of reality really settled in on them like a heavy winter cloak, before they became more firmly grounded to the earth and learned the full meaning of the things called 'logic' and 'rationale.'

Niou stood up, leaving his half-formed plans in the earth with the abandoned stick, lifting his head up to look at the sky just like Yukimura was doing. He was silent, before turning to his friend, offering a little lopsided grin to his friend. "Sounds fun," he said. "If it's you, then I think it's possible." If it was Yukimura, Niou thought that anything was possible. He couldn't say exactly why, but Yukimura always seemed to exude a quiet air of confidence, one that said that he could do anything if he deemed it a worthy cause. It inspired Niou; it really did. Yukimura Seiichi was one of the few boys his own age that Niou really looked up to, be it in the capital or… back at his village. The mere beginnings of the thought of his former home made him swallow, wondering how on earth that big lump got into his throat or why the back of his throat had the disgustingly metallic taste of iron. Finally, he turned to Yukimura, hiding everything with a charming little boy's smile.

Yukimura saw through him, of course. He always did, but he didn't ask about it. Instead, his face blossomed into an absolutely ecstatic expression, and there were not enough words to describe the look of utter and complete happiness present there, so dazzling that the sun in all its glory was put to shame. The young heir held out his hand, pinky up. Curious, Niou brought his own hand up, hooking his pinky with the proffered one. "I want to make a promise, Niou-kun. When we grow up, we're going to create a new order in Rikkai. Rikkai will be the strongest kingdom of them all."

He turned his head to the side, and when Niou followed his gaze, he found Sanada, Yanagi, and Marui standing not too far from them. They stepped forward, putting their hands on Niou's and Yukimura's joined hands when Yukimura beckoned them to him. "We'll be the strongest," Yukimura repeated. "We'll be the strongest because we'll always be looking after one another, and any battle that's one of ours is all of ours, and we will never, ever, ever, abandon anyone.

"Promise," he murmured.

"Promise," they echoed back, five pair of eyes glowing as they dropped their hands.

Later, when they had all gone to bed like the good little boys that they were, Niou snuck out of the dormitory and trotted off to the courtyard. Planting himself right next to the fountain, he stared up at the night sky, eyes riveted on the moon. It was a full moon, white light soft and reassuring, if not a bit cold. "Mother!" he called out, and Yukimura's father, who happened to be going around the courtyard via the surrounding corridor at that exact moment, paused in his steps to watch the solitary figure.

"Mother! I made a promise today!" Niou called out to the moon. "We promised to be the strongest, and to never be alone!"

A small smile tugged across the mouth of the silent observer, and he was about to move on when Niou stopped him by continuing to speak. The man drew back behind a pillar, listening despite that little conscious voice in his mind telling him that it was a sin to eavesdrop on the conversations of others, much less the conversations of others with their departed loved ones. But his curiosity had gotten the better of him, and he had squashed the little voice like a bug.

"Mother, I'll make a promise with you, too. I'm going to work extra hard, and, when I become really strong, I'll destroy the mage who hurt you!"

Even from behind the pillar, in the dark, the elder Yukimura could see the young boy trembling. Closing his eyes, he could feel the radiating emotions coming from the other, the muted rage, the undying sorrow, the bit of bewilderment that never seemed to go away. The emotions gathered around the boy, enveloping him, colliding with each other until they became a spectrum that was undecipherable.

The man stepped out from behind the pillar, making his way quietly over to him so that he could put his hand on the youngster's fluffy head. "It's a bright moon tonight," he noted.

Niou looked up at him, hastily wiping away the tears that had accumulated without him wanting them to, hoping that the man didn't see them. Yukimura pretends not to notice Niou's trembling lower lip. "Yes, sir," he replied politely.

"Shouldn't you be asleep in the dorms, instead of out here watching the moon?" the head of Rikkai asked with a smile on his face.

A tiny, "I couldn't sleep," was his answer, and Yukimura removed his hand from Niou's head, transferring it instead to his shoulder.

"Sleep is necessary for growing boys," he chides, and Niou is silent, before asking him:

"How long will I have to train until I can defeat a Dark Mage?"

Yukimura is taken by surprise at the question. "Pardon?" he asks.

Niou looks up at him, blue eyes seeming to shine eerily even though his face is in shadow. Yukimura cannot help but find it a bit unnerving. "How long will I need to train in order to defeat a Dark Mage?" Niou repeats patiently. "A Dark Mage destroyed my family, so I will destroy the Dark Mage."

And Yukimura does not know why, but there is a tingling in his spine and for the briefest of moments, the stirring of real fear from the power that is enveloping the boy is a bit too much for him to handle. But, as quickly as it came, it vanished, and then Niou was his usual child-like self, apologizing for staying up late and then scampering off to bed. Yukimura is left by himself to ponder what exactly the silver-haired child is like, before silently shaking his head. Niou was the son of the High Family, and there were a lot of things about that family that he did not know about.

_But as of now,_ he thought to himself, turning his face to the moon, _he is simply a growing boy. A lot of things will change as he grows older. _Old wounds healed a bit, and grudges usually receded slightly with time. "Such an interesting boy you've left behind, Niou-san," he says quietly, giving a small nod of his head.

The little Niou was an interesting boy indeed.

* * *

Yagyuu was more than pleased with his plans. Reclining back in his chair, parchment with a carefully drawn map of the capitol spread out in front of him, he traced the capitol's walls lazily with a finger. Haru is curled up on his lap like a pampered Siamese cat, purring contently, pleased that his master was so satisfied. His tail flicked idly from side to side as one of Yagyuu's hands wandered down to stroke his head.

The purring increased.

"Zacharias, you can come out now," Yagyuu says quietly, not looking at the corner of the room where the shadows are stirring ever so slightly. In truth, Yagyuu had found it to be slightly amusing, watching his underling try to conceal himself within the shadows to spy on him. It was a pity that Haru was so adept in finding those who did not belong in certain places. Yagyuu's fingers moved to scratch behind the Shadow Demon's ears before nudging it off of his lap. Haru landed gracefully on the ground and stalked over to the shadow.

Zacharias detached himself from the corner and stepped forward, dropping down on one knee before Yagyuu's chair. "I apologize for the intrusion, My Lord," he says, dark eyes turned politely to the ground, "but your previous orders were for me to return at nightfall. My demons are just outside the room; they are eager to know what commands My Lord has in store for them."

Yagyuu gestures nonchalantly to Haru and states: "Bring them in, Haru. It's impolite to leave such eager guests outside." Haru dives into a shadow, reappearing moments later followed by a score of identical-looking Shadow Demons. They arranged themselves neatly behind their handler, Haru leaping forward to sit at Yagyuu's feet. Only Haru has that esteemed honor; he was Yagyuu's favorite and most trusted, if that man was even capable of trusting deep within his twisted mind and his destroyed soul.

Yagyuu stands, robes rustling as he straightens them. "Zacharias, I am putting you in charge of an infiltration unit. Tonight, we are going to the capitol and taking it. I've sat here waiting for those walls to crumble for far too long. It is now apparent to me that they won't fall without some outside help." He pushes his glasses up to a firmer position, pacing slightly in front of his chair. "Shadow Demons alone do not amount to much power, but we have numbers on our side. The infiltration unit will be in charge of entering the capitol and removing the guards stationed from play."

Here, he tosses a small pouch to his subordinate, who shoots out a hand, catching is expertly. "Open it," Yagyuu commands, and the handler obeys, gently pouring the pouch's contents out onto the floor in front of his knee. Small circular trinkets the size of marbles greeted him, and he looks up to Yagyuu in confusion. Surely his esteemed master didn't like playing with children's toys …?

"That amount is for your demons," Yagyuu instructs. "Each is a thin-walled capsule, which I have filled with poison. Haru, demonstrate how it works." Haru leaps onto his shoulder as Yagyuu presents a capsule to him. Taking it delicately in his jaws, he leaps back down onto the ground, while his master summons a cage onto the table, within which was caged a rather frightened rabbit. Haru slips into the cage through a small shadow, stealing up behind the poor animal, which was quivering with fear in the middle, beady little eyes warily looking out through the bars, completely unaware of Haru even though rabbits were so keen to startle and flee at the slightest mentioning of danger.

A quick snap of his jaws and the capsule breaks, pierced with sharp teeth, leaking its poison over the creature's fur. The defenseless animal squeals and leaps forward, pawing frantically at the bars of the cage. Zacharias can only watch in fascinated horror as the animal tries in vain to escape, throwing itself again and again against the unyielding bars until finally it stops, its fluffy body twitching as it curls up into a tiny ball and the poison runs its course, sliding down through the fur and then going through the skin, carried by the blood to all the essential organs. It hurts, of course, as it burns through tissue and nerves, but all in all it is a fast working poison. A few seconds of pain, several shuddering breaths, violent shaking, and the animal is dead, heat leaving its body as it gives one last twitch of its forelegs. Haru, on the other hand, is unaffected, and calmly spits the broken capsule out of his mouth before leaving the cage and padding over to Yagyuu, where he receives a nod for a demonstration done well.

"I've designed this poison so that the Shadow Demons who use them are not affected. But only they are immune to it, so it would be in your best interest to leave the capsules intact." Yagyuu sits back down and watches quietly as Zacharias hastily gathers up the capsules and inserts them back into the bag, being careful to handle them with care. The fear in his actions is almost laughable to the mage. "The other handlers and their demons have received their instructions already. I have also instructed them to report to you as soon as their demons were in place. As you can see, this poison acts with quite some pain on the part of its victim. I want all of the Shadow Demons to break their capsules onto the guards at the same time in order to minimize the amount of warning the ailing guards can give to their allies."

A slow smile spreads over his face as he talks. "A person in pain's first tendency is to think for himself and figure out how to get rid of the pain. When all of the guards are under such intense amount of pain, they will not care for the conditions of the others. This human trait will buy you enough time to open the gates. An attack unit will enter the capitol itself while the rest of my units will make the walls crumble from the outside."

"My Lord intends to destroy Rikkai's seat of power completely," Zacharias summarizes, beginning to see where this was going. He is pleased; his demon heart thumping with admiration at his liege's utter genius.

"Exactly," purrs Yagyuu. "Just think, when that little assassin returns to a destroyed capitol… his expression will be a sight to see."

"But, My Lord," Zacharias interjects, "what if Rikkai appeals to Seigaku or Hyoutei for aid? Surely My Lord does not intend to fight all three kingdoms at the same time…?"

Normally, Yagyuu would have been irked by such a statement, but excited as he was, he paid it little attention. "I've severed links between Rikkai and the other two powerful kingdoms for the past few months. Any information that can lead one to suspect that Rikkai would face danger from us was destroyed. Border skirmishes and the like I care nothing about." He rests his chin in his hand, giving a small nod of his head. "It is amusing to find that there are many people within Rikkai who have such twisted hearts that they would turn away from all the efforts of that Yukimura. He's a fool, but an earnest and persistent one. His son, too."

A tiny voice in the back of his mind quips, _She was, too!_ Yagyuu's eyes narrow into golden slits, and he chooses to ignore the voice. "I'll have to take extra care to pay Marui some special attention," he murmurs to himself. Waving his hand idly, he states, "You're dismissed, Zacharias. Be prepared to move in an hour."

Zacharias rises, performing a deep bow before leaving the room, his demons scampering after him. When the door fully closes Yagyuu heaves a sigh, removing his glasses and rubbing at the bridge of his nose. His initial excitement is slowly ebbing away; now he is focusing on what kind of resistance Yukimura and his subjects would plan against him. They were not the kind of people to give up without a fight, and Yagyuu certainly did not expect them to simply roll over quietly and let him walk all over them.

That would be no fun.

Hara sits on the little table in front of Yagyuu, tail flicking slightly as he washes himself like a cat, using slow methodic licks of his tongue. He stops when Yagyuu straightens up, and peers curiously at his Master. _'You wish for something, Master?'_ the demon asks, ruby eyes shining at the prospect of having another job to do.

"I want you to follow our little assassin," Yagyuu muses, as if this was an idea that was only beginning to be formed in his devious mind. "I want to learn more about him. I want to… get to know him. Then I can think of the best way to play around with him."

Hara purrs, bobbing his head up and down smartly before diving into a shadow. Yagyuu watched his tail tip vanish before turning back to his map. "Well, Yukimura," he murmurs into the emptiness, "what will you do, when you witness me destroy everything that you've worked so hard to build?"

His eyes shine with the dangerous light of a predator that has spotted its prey and cornered it in preparation for the kill. "I will crush you and the Rikkai that you love so dearly. You will soon see how human trust is a silly thing. Humans have such fickle hearts."

* * *

Niou woke up with a throbbing headache, blinking furiously to bring his world into focus. He was covered with a thin blanket, and there was a cat purring in his ear, annoying whiskers tickling his cheek. His whole body aches, and his back is poked with straw every time he shifts on the mattress, the straw stuffing threatening to spill out of the worn linen that holds it together. Sitting up and massaging his pounding head, he dislodges the cat from his pillow and watches it half-heartedly as it moves elsewhere.

It stops purring, though, and crouches into a hunting stance almost as soon as it relocates itself to a patch of sunlight. Its sharp eyes have spotted a mouse, and in a few short moments the rodent is dead, the cat's quick movements and hunting prowess earning it its breakfast.

Niou decided that he was at a farmhouse. Only farm cats hunted and killed for sustenance; the cats he saw around more populous areas usually hunted for the thrill or simply to appease their wilder nature. They never ate their kills, though. Why eat that when they went home to owners who fed them fish and rich cream?

He watches the cat daintily pick at its meal in a corner of the lofty room that he is in before shaking his head, biting his lip and willing the throbbing pain to go away. It remains, staying stubbornly like a thorn in his side. His bag was placed to the side of his mattress, though, and Niou reaches over, fumbling around in it until he finds Yanagi's herb package, wondering if there was water nearby so that he could make himself a cup of tea. He's torn between using peppermint or rosemary, although he finally settles with peppermint, wrapping the rest back up neatly and tucking it away.

Holding the herb gently in his hand, he does a quick inventory of his bag. Nothing is missing, but when he gets to a side pocket, he lets out a hiss of surprise, accidentally crushing the peppermint leaves in his hand, their scent spreading into the air. The small vial of poison, his revenge tool, his most guarded possession, was gone. He couldn't have dropped it; Niou was far too careful to perform a stupid mistake like that.

"That demon bastard," he growls, shoving his bag to one side, forcing his complaining body out of bed and into a standing position. Hiro takes the time to reveal himself, peeking out from underneath Niou's pillow, glowing gently as the Illusionary takes in Niou's dark mood. The assassin is planning a thousand and one horribly painful deaths for that demon, that stupid demon with the annoying blue snake-like tongue and the mockingly cold black eyes, with his Shadow Demons that followed him around so faithfully. Should Niou break every bone in his demon body? Should he cut off his fingers and then tie him to a tree, leaving him food for the crows? Each possibility gets more and more graphic, until he can barely draw breath, shaking with fury. The demon could have taken anything from his bag and Niou would not have become even remotely as furious as he was now, but the poison… his treasure… he could not be without it.

Hiro lands on his shoulder, tiny wings fluttering, light growing brighter until it bathes Niou in its gentle glow. The assassin's rage subsides, and he collapses, spent, backwards onto the uncomfortably itchy straw mattress. Hiro then migrates to his chest. The dull aches and throbs and general discomforts of his body are erased, one by one, and Niou closes his eyes as Hiro works his magic, although he had not a clue what kind it was. It was stronger than healing, but he couldn't classify it.

Yanagi probably could, though. Niou misses the mage, with his careful and methodical personality and perpetually closed eyes. He misses everyone back at Rikkai, actually, including the usually grumpy Sanada and the annoying Marui who liked to overdose himself on sugar. How were they, he wondered?

"Oh, you're awake!" a woman's voice gasps from the entrance of Niou's current room, just seconds before Hiro dives within the safety of Niou's hair. She doesn't notice, though. "Jo will be so happy! I've never seen him in such a panic before…" Her voice trails off as she leaves, calling for the aforementioned boy. Niou remembers the kid dimly. He had been having a conversation with him about demons before that idiot came along.

"Get in the bag," he instructs Hiro, pushing himself into a more dignified position, straightening out his clothes as he does so. Hiro obeys, and Niou shuts the bag, swinging it over his shoulder as he stands. Jo appears moments later, the child looking immensely relieved.

"Are you feeling alright?" he asks, while Niou asks, "You're not hurt, are you?" at the same time. The kid stops, blinks at him, before shaking his head, turning around and moving his arms and legs to show that he was intact and perfectly fine. "Mister took all the damage," he says. Niou gives a low grunt as an answer, striding towards the doorway and he runs after him, tugging at his arm.

"Mother wants you to stay for the noon meal. She knows you're a traveler, but won't you please stay?" Jo begs, his eyes big and pleading, and though Niou is not in the least bit pleased at hearing that it was at least midday, he can't shake the kid from him. His protests of not wanting to trouble the farming family fall on deaf ears; the mother overhears and promptly proceeds to tell him that it's no trouble at all, that a night's rest and a meal are nothing considering how he had protected her only son from a devastating creature. In the end, Niou just gives up the argument, figuring that he can just make up some of his lost time by travelling at night.

Besides, the meal was delicious, and he was even given a small package of more food to take for his journey. He made a mental note to himself to share some with Hiro, once he figured out how Illusionaries sustained themselves.

"Thank you for the room and the meal," Niou says politely afterwards, fitting his cloak over his shoulders and bowing in a gracious manner. "I hope that this season is a kind one and you have a good harvest."

The farmer's wife smiles at him, doing a quick little curtsy. "Thank you, sir. Have a safe trip!" Jo echoes her statements and Niou turns to leave. Mother and son vanish inside their home shortly after, musing quietly to each other about the mysterious man that was their guest for the night. "Do you think he's a nobleman?" Jo's mother asks curiously. "He's a rather handsome young man, and I hear that the sons of aristocrats train in hand-to-hand combat because they have nothing better to do with their time."

Jo shrugs, preparing to go outside to help his father in the fields. "Whoever he was, he was the coolest person I've ever met!" he says proudly. He is silent for a few seconds, before announcing, "You know what? I'm going to be just like him!"

His mother raises an eyebrow, lips twisting into a dry smile. "Which part? I hope you'll grow up to be as polite as he was."

He huffs, childishly pouting as his cheeks flush with color. "I'm going to be just as strong, just as cool, and just as mysterious as he was! Just you wait and see!" he retorts hotly, before marching out the door, followed by his mother's outright laughter.

As the door shuts and life returns to the usual quiet around the house, Haru detaches himself from the shadow of the cupboard, slinking to another shadow and sliding into it. As he emerges from a shadow outside the house, his nose wrinkles in disgust. What was so great about the assassin? Haru had observed him quietly from the shadows while he had slept and then some afterwards before padding away to steal some food from the unsuspecting human woman's pantry, and nothing had impressed the Shadow Demon. Niou's rage was nothing compared to his masters, and he had just barely managed to edge out an advantage over Zacharius the night before. His tail lashes in frustration as he speeds through the undergrowth, diving into a shadow just before he can see his target and then slipping from shadow to shadow.

Niou was weak. There was nothing to be gained by looking up to weak people. Humans were so pathetically foolish.

* * *

_What makes you have the ability to be a role model? Are you physically strong? Have you lived long and gained great wisdom? Perhaps you have achieved great success in something or another. No… because you are you, and you matter to someone… that is why you are looked up to._

* * *

A/N: Guess what? I still exist! :D

I heard somewhere that rabbits emit horrendously high-pitched noises when they died, but that was years ago on a documentary about lynxs. If that's not the case, feel free to tell me otherwise. I'm all-together too lazy to look it up. It's summer and I just sit in the A/C before dragging myself into the heat and to the hospital to do volunteer work. Life is busy. Life is good. XD

**Reviews** are still always very much appreciated. Please look forward to the next chapter; there will be epical Yukimuras present! ^_^


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